I like it!

Nathaniel Porter said:

What happened to the plan to ban bull bars on the public highway?
There's no need for them there really.

It's a bit like th e bells on bikes scenario, except in reverse; it is not
permitted to sell a vehicle new with bull bars fitted, but it is OK to add
them after purchase. So you can go and buy your SUV, and immediately get
bars fitted at the garage round the corner. This is what pisses me off most:
every 4x4 you see with bull bars has had them fitted on owner's active
insistence -- they are willfully making their vehicles more dangerous to
peds and the like! [censored].

Tony Raven said:

I think that was a bit of journalistic license. We have the V8 Discovery and
rarely get below 20mpg. You would have to do really stupid driving to get it
down to 8mpg.

I'm sure that with numerous short, stop-start journeys in London in
the morning hate, you could manage it.

Simonb said:

every 4x4 you see with bull bars has had them fitted on owner's active
insistence -- they are willfully making their vehicles more dangerous to
peds and the like!

And that affects the driver how, exactly?

(In fairness, they offer protection against hazards in these vehicles'
natural habitat. i.e. they protect lights from shopping trolleys in
Waitrose's car park).

in message <[email hidden]>, Tony Raven

(') said:

dirtylitterboxofferingstospammers said:

Indeed it can be when the personal choice of one person severely
impinges on the quality of life of others in a very adverse way.
That's called "being a selfish ar$eh*le"

What does a four wheel drive car do that is so different from a two
wheel drive car that only the former seriously adversely impinges on
others' quality
of life? If I have a car with switchable two and four wheel drive,
does using
the switch convert me in and out of being a selfish ar$eh*le? Curious
minds want to know.

OK, I drive a vehicle (you might call it a car, I call it a truck) which
is switchable between two and four wheel drive. It's considerably
larger than most cars, considerably taller, has much poorer
aerodynamics and is somewhat less economic on fuel, and consequently
more polluting. Mine doesn't have a V8 engine, automatic transmission,
air conditioning or other such purely Chelsea appertenances, so it's
not as bad as it might be.

But in city traffic (which to be fair it very rarely sees) it is
antisocial. It occupies more space on the road than most; it blocks
people's eyelines, and it creates unnecessary pollution.

--
[email hidden] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

;; Semper in faecibus sumus, sole profundum variat.

Al C-F said:

I'm sure that with numerous short, stop-start journeys in London in
the morning hate, you could manage it.

And what would be the mpg of a frugal car in those circumstances? 12mpg? You
could make them all 0mpg by parking them up and leaving the engine running

Tony

Tony Raven said:

You can achieve all those by staying back from the car in front. Even
overtaking is easier if you stay back to get a better view although the modern
style seems to be to tailgate and pop out.

Tony

He is talking about London you know.

Lets see what are the advantages to having a Tonka in London:

1) Low mpg
2) No crumple zones
3) Bumber height that matches head height in normal cars
giving the owner the ability to bypass the side impact zones
and stuff it straight through the window of the car or ride
over the bonnet and stuff it into the windscreen.
4) Poor braking distance and driven as though they are cars
and not trucks to exasperate the above feature.
5) Improve the owners view at the expense of others.
6) Poor manouverability in narrow London streets to cause
maximal delay when two or more come down the same narrow
street at a time from opposite ways.
7) The ability to not have to bother to slow down for speed
humps/ramps especially near schools.

Owning one in London may not make you an idiot per se but it
does make you a bit of a selfish [censored], which is handy as you
normally know to avoid people in them, they are sort of an
identity kit. Like permanently on fog lights and loud stereos.

Gotta keep up with the Jones!

My favourites are the [censored] who lower them and put big
chrome all over them. Class.

in message <[email hidden]>, [Not

Responding (') said:

Banning or slowing down traffic around schools would get my support.
Banning or taxing polluting vehicles would get my support. But picking
on 4x4s merely because of their design is, in Ken's words, "idiotic".

'4x4' is, here, being used as shorthand. While there are small, light,
relatively economic 4x4s (the Fiat Panda 4x4, the Subaru Justy, the
Suzuki Jimny) the fact is that the majority of extra large, extra
polluting cars on urban roads are Range-Rover lookalikes which have,
among other features, four wheel drive. I don't believe that
Livingstone meant 'things like a Suzuki Jimny' when he said '4x4'. I
think he meant things like Range Rovers, Grand Cherokees, Shoguns, X5s
and the like.

And I agree with him. I think they are utterly unsuitable for urban use,
and anyone who buys one for mainly urban use is, in his words,
'idiotic'. But I'll continue to drive my Frontera, because for remote
rural use, bits of forestry, hauling boats around and other things
which are part of my every day life, it's extremely useful.

--
[email hidden] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/
Windows 95:
You, you, you! You make a grown man cry...
M. Jagger/K. Richards

"Nathaniel Porter" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I cited the 8mpg programme from a J*r*my Cl*rks*n dockumentary on the
history of cars. They took an off-road (a Freelander IIRC) and drove it
around town for a while (in true stereotypical "Chelsea tractor" style)

and

Quoted message said:

then calculated the milage - which worked out a 8 mpg. Of course you'd get
higher in the country.

It was a Range Rover (V8 thingie in it).

Neil

[email hidden] (dirtylitterboxofferingstospammers) wrote in message news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Article in the Telegraph today.

It's online, but you have to register for the Telegraph to access it..

Here's part.

"Livingstone condemns 'Chelsea tractor' drivers
By George Jones, Political Editor
(Filed: 22/05/2004)

Londoners who use four-wheel-drive vehicles and people carriers on the school
run are complete idiots, according to Ken Livingstone, the London Mayor.

Four-wheel-drive vehicles, such as Range Rovers, and up-market BMW and
Mercedes, are known in London as "Chelsea tractors" - which rarely go off road.

In an interview for GMTV's Sunday Programme to be broadcast tomorrow, Mr
Livingstone said: "When I see a farmer going over rugged terrain in a
four-wheel drive, I think that's a reasonable decision to have made.

"When you see someone trying to manoeuvre it round the school gates, you have
to think, 'You are a complete idiot'."

I think he's totally correct :-)

Indeed and let's hope OPEC keep the oil price going up to weed out a
few of these gas guzzlers. I've seen a few large 4x4s on the road with
"for sale" signs on recently.

--
Simon M.

dirtylitterboxofferingstospammers posted ...

Quoted message said:

Off-roaders have their uses - off-road. For use as described above,
they indicate quite a different thing altogether.

What about those of us who use an off-roader both off-road, and take it to
the shops, or to drop the kids at school occasionally ?

We have a choice to make, and buying one vehicle that can satisfy the
multiple roles that we use vehicles for makes far more economical,
environmental and basic common sense than having the seven or eight
'specialist' vehicles we'd need to satisfy our lifestyle.

--
Paul

(8(|) Homer rocks .. 😉

Simon Mason posted ...

Quoted message said:

[email hidden] (dirtylitterboxofferingstospammers) wrote

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

"When you see someone trying to manoeuvre it round the school gates,
you have
to think, 'You are a complete idiot'."

I think he's totally correct :-)

Indeed and let's hope OPEC keep the oil price going up to weed out a
few of these gas guzzlers. I've seen a few large 4x4s on the road with
"for sale" signs on recently.

I agree .. I'm after a decent V8 to use purely for off-roading and petrol
guzzling .. 😉

--
Paul

(8(|) Homer rocks .. 😉

Tony Raven said:

Doki said:

I generally drive quite quickly myself, but doing it in a 4x4 is a
particularly daft thing to do because they don't go round corners or stop
nearly as well as a big car does.

Providing you make allowances for that and corner more slowly and leave more
braking room why's it a problem?

The bulk of the anecdotal evidence suggests that most of the people
driving them don't do that - they are, as Ken Livingstone said,
"complete idiots".

But even if you are making allowances by cornering more slowly and
leaving more braking room, that's taking up more road space and
increasing congestion, which in London is still pretty antisocial.

Quoted message said:

Or should we all drive Porsches and Lotuses
on the basis that they corner and stop much better than your average car?

I would tend to discourage this approach, as straw men usually lack
the muscular and skeletal strength to be considered adequately in
control of a motor vehicle.

-dan

--
"please make sure that the person is your friend before you confirm"

Not Responding said:

Of more interest was the second part of Ken's interview. Where he said
that he wanted to stop Londoners concreting over their front gardens
to make car parking space. This one would get my vote every time. The

Apparently it's what's known as a "free country" (the UK used to be
one, I read somewhere).

-dan

--
"please make sure that the person is your friend before you confirm"

On Sat, 22 May 2004 14:37:54 +0100, Daniel Barlow <[email hidden]>

Quoted message said:

Not Responding said:

Of more interest was the second part of Ken's interview. Where he said
that he wanted to stop Londoners concreting over their front gardens
to make car parking space. This one would get my vote every time. The

Apparently it's what's known as a "free country" (the UK used to be
one, I read somewhere).

-dan

Not the freedom to do things of benefit only to oneself at the expense
of the wider community. In this instance, the concreting of front
gardens is bad news for pretty much everyone with the exception of the
person who gets free parking.

Paul - censored said:

What about those of us who use an off-roader both off-road, and take it to
the shops, or to drop the kids at school occasionally ?

We have a choice to make, and buying one vehicle that can satisfy the
multiple roles that we use vehicles for makes far more economical,
environmental and basic common sense than having the seven or eight
'specialist' vehicles we'd need to satisfy our lifestyle.

Fine if you believe that the majority of people who have
these vehicles have based there choice on rational grounds
then thats your choice. I think they got them so that when
they park at Holmes Place and Sainsburys they can exude
outdoor life style and not look out of place. Say it isnt so.

Anyway they're old hat now, didnt you know that Hummers are
appearing on the streets of London. Mines bigger than yours!

Not Responding said:

Not the freedom to do things of benefit only to oneself at the expense
of the wider community. In this instance, the concreting of front
gardens is bad news for pretty much everyone with the exception of the
person who gets free parking.

Have you considered that being forced to do gardening might be bad news for
pretty much everyone but yourself?

Tony

Daniel Barlow said:

The bulk of the anecdotal evidence suggests that most of the people
driving them don't do that - they are, as Ken Livingstone said,
"complete idiots".

For many people the bulk of the anecdotal evidence suggests that most cyclists
are lycra louts who ignore red lights and should be banned from the roads.

Quoted message said:

But even if you are making allowances by cornering more slowly and
leaving more braking room, that's taking up more road space and
increasing congestion, which in London is still pretty antisocial.

How much more. Can you quantify it? Should they all drive Smart Cars

Quoted message said:

I would tend to discourage this approach, as straw men usually lack
the muscular and skeletal strength to be considered adequately in
control of a motor vehicle.

Straw men may, but surely sports cars are much easier to drive than the
vehicles they are currently using

Tony

Vincent Wilcox said:

Fine if you believe that the majority of people who have
these vehicles have based there choice on rational grounds
then thats your choice.

Do you have evidence they haven't? How can you tell? If you looked at me
driving my 4x4 how would you tell whether I had rationale grounds for choosing
it?

Quoted message said:

I think they got them so that when
they park at Holmes Place and Sainsburys they can exude
outdoor life style and not look out of place. Say it isnt so.

There you go then. Nobody who wants to "be seen" goes to Sainsburys.
Waitrose, dear boy, Waitrose.

Quoted message said:

Anyway they're old hat now, didnt you know that Hummers are
appearing on the streets of London.

So are stretched limos.

Tony

Tony Raven said:

Ningi said:

On a bike, being able to see past, or over, the car in front allows me
to decide where to overtake, see traffic lights, junctions etc. I can
get in the right position, pick lanes at junctions, See in advance if I
have to turn off the road etc. It's just easier if you have more notice
on what's coming up.

You can achieve all those by staying back from the car in front. Even
overtaking is easier if you stay back to get a better view although the modern
style seems to be to tailgate and pop out.

Tony

And if you stay that far back, the car behind you will overtake and cut
into a gap that's not really suitable, thus squeezing your on your bike
in the process...

--

Velvet

Al C-F said:

Simonb said:

every 4x4 you see with bull bars has had them fitted on owner's active
insistence -- they are willfully making their vehicles more dangerous to
peds and the like!

And that affects the driver how, exactly?

(In fairness, they offer protection against hazards in these vehicles'
natural habitat. i.e. they protect lights from shopping trolleys in
Waitrose's car park).

If a driver needs bull-bars to protect their lights from shopping
trolleys, then I'd suggest they're unfit to be in charge of a vehicle as
large as that (their 4x4ish thing, NOT the trolley, though sometimes I
wonder about that too..) - if they can't manuevre it in a confined space
without running over trolleys, what chance have they of seeing and not
squishing a kid?

--

Velvet