martin clark
pinko bodger
This.And as much as I’d love all cars to come in at less than 1,500kg, it would be an expensive rule to implement. A Golf can come in at 1,600kg, and a Pug 308 SW can hit over 1,800kg. It’s not as if you can sit in any of these cars, look around, and say “Yeah, I can remove 500kg by taking out that, that and that. They’re not needed, waste of space and money.”
Interesting aside - my old beast, an e39 5-series, electric seats, ..vs new Mini countryman: having giggled seeng one such park next to mine, I looked Them up: the Mini averages 120mm taller, 25-50mm wider in body, spec-dependant. The Mini is 350mm shorter- but worse packaging in the interior, by far... cramped in interior width, and footwells; and (depending on options ) between 100Kg lighter, to 50Kg heavier: yet it counts as a 'subcompact SUV'. wtaf?
'Safety' as an argument, only goes so far; and when you count the massive % increase in use of light materials (usu. plastics - as much as 30% of a car these days, following recent research for other reasons) - there's no small amount that accrues from 'feature bloat'.