I have an ancient tiny pickup (don't get me started on EVs or how a van is better, I'm aware but poor and I don't live/work in a city) and I'd say about 1-2 times a week when daily driving I'll get mocked by someone with a giant, lifted, accent-lighted, chrome-trimmed, perfectly-unscathed monstrosity. Usually some form of homophoplbic slur to describe my vehicle choice.
I fill up for less than half the price, and I fit right next to most regular cars. I still park out in the empties because I don't like being next to other vehicles, but I don't have to.
Honestly I'd love an EV with a minivan size profile, truck clearance, and the enclosed rear is all cargo space. Literally all of my hobbies and work things would fit in it, and since I live on a hill in the middle of fields, I get a lot of wind and solar.
Of course, I'd love it even more if I could take a nap on a train with space for an equipment cart while I travel half an hour to work, but the next ice age will happen before passenger trains become that widespread.
The Nissan e-NV200 was expected to be available by 2017 for the NYC Taxi of Tomorrow fleet.[93] However, structural changes would be required to bring the e-NV200 into compliance with US Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards,[94] and the van never was released to the US market.
Makes sense, European crash testing looks for different things and the e-NV200 was only ever passed as a commercial vehicle here so you couldn't use one as a taxi.
That seems great for the "we go from fancy campground to fancy campground and stay for half a week" crowd, but most camper van owners are not in that group, right?
Out of all the recent innovations in trucks, the only ones I'd really consider useful is having 120V power plugs in the bed and reversing cameras. Neither is required, but they do make things much easier.
But also, I am far more likely to assume that someone driving a Tacoma or Ranger is using it to do work than I am someone driving a 'full size' pickup.
More evidence, if any was needed, that advertising works. The entire product is built on marketing a self-image to those who for whatever reason aren't perceptive enough to see how they've been manipulated by the advertising industry.
I'm somewhat guilty of it myself when it comes to outdoors activities that I'm passionate about like climbing and hiking and backpacking and snowboarding. I know a lot of it is overpriced bullshit that I don't actually need, but sometimes I'm like "here, just take my money, I must have that fancy new piece of gear or equipment!" At least I'm aware of it though.
Nobody’s mad at someone using a reasonably sized pickup when they need the functionality. The goal is the least polluting vehicle you can reasonably get for your use case.
I have an ancient tiny pickup (don't get me started on EVs or how a van is better, I'm aware but poor and I don't live/work in a city) and I'd say about 1-2 times a week when daily driving I'll get mocked by someone with a giant, lifted, accent-lighted, chrome-trimmed, perfectly-unscathed monstrosity. Usually some form of homophoplbic slur to describe my vehicle choice.
I fill up for less than half the price, and I fit right next to most regular cars. I still park out in the empties because I don't like being next to other vehicles, but I don't have to.
Honestly I'd love an EV with a minivan size profile, truck clearance, and the enclosed rear is all cargo space. Literally all of my hobbies and work things would fit in it, and since I live on a hill in the middle of fields, I get a lot of wind and solar.
Of course, I'd love it even more if I could take a nap on a train with space for an equipment cart while I travel half an hour to work, but the next ice age will happen before passenger trains become that widespread.
A Nissan e-NV200 is what you want … I'm in Spain, there's a few about. They're basic work vans, good amount of space in them, easily fixable, etc.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_NV200
Looks like GM rebadged it was a Chevy Express in 2014 and discontinued it in 2017.
Makes sense, European crash testing looks for different things and the e-NV200 was only ever passed as a commercial vehicle here so you couldn't use one as a taxi.
They are well handy, it's a shame.
Also make superb camper vans if you aren’t too mad about the 150 mile range!
That seems great for the "we go from fancy campground to fancy campground and stay for half a week" crowd, but most camper van owners are not in that group, right?
Proper working man's pickups those unlike the new ones that have all this fancy shite that you wouldn't want in a work vehicle
I've had people argue that all the fancy stuff is needed in a work vehicle
Out of all the recent innovations in trucks, the only ones I'd really consider useful is having 120V power plugs in the bed and reversing cameras. Neither is required, but they do make things much easier.
But also, I am far more likely to assume that someone driving a Tacoma or Ranger is using it to do work than I am someone driving a 'full size' pickup.
More evidence, if any was needed, that advertising works. The entire product is built on marketing a self-image to those who for whatever reason aren't perceptive enough to see how they've been manipulated by the advertising industry.
I'm somewhat guilty of it myself when it comes to outdoors activities that I'm passionate about like climbing and hiking and backpacking and snowboarding. I know a lot of it is overpriced bullshit that I don't actually need, but sometimes I'm like "here, just take my money, I must have that fancy new piece of gear or equipment!" At least I'm aware of it though.
Nobody’s mad at someone using a reasonably sized pickup when they need the functionality. The goal is the least polluting vehicle you can reasonably get for your use case.
i feel like if we applied this logic to most things, the world would be a better place…
At least yours is actually useful for something 👍