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Hybrids in the News
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Comments
Sixty percent off EPA is a bit different from 3-4 MPG on your Maxima, dont you think?
We KNOW that 99% of the population is not getting 60% below EPA because if so, those owners would be rebelling and returning their cars to Toyota.
quote dewey - "What tests proved the 109MPG figure? "-end quote
My, My we art behind the 8-ball today:
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05220/550484.stm
HAVE YOU HAD YOUR
PROZAC TODAY?
48 MPG is 80% of the EPA City rating, and it's 87% of the EPA combined MPG for the Prius, which is 55.5 MPG. That's a long way from missing by 60% !!!
In order to achieve extreme fuel economy, the team primarily used a gas-saving technique called pulse and glide. It's a form of coasting that involves releasing the gas pedal, then pressing it slightly again to disengage the electric motors. And as they glide, the drivers glance at a built-in screen displaying vital statistics like average miles per gallon.
LOL, I can ride faster with my bicycle and save even more gas! That article was more funny than serious
PROZAC TODAY?
Falconone,
Driving extremely slow in a depressive state will enhance gas mileage! Prozac may cause more pedal happy behavior and hinder MPG
C'mon these real drivers are as representative to the real population as "Barney the Dinosaur" is representative of aTyrannosaurus rex!
Let's stick to recent news items in here. I'll be moving post to the appropriate discussion.
A fun drive.
Great Milestone !! :shades:
http://news.cincypost.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051125/NEWS01/511250344
And it's not FAIR in any way....punish people because their cars get better gas mileage - oh yes, that's completely reasonable !! DUH ???? :confuse:
Actually, the larger issue is that states are overreacting to lost gas tax revenue. They are not losing "noticable" gas tax to the hybrid owners at the current sales volume of hybrids. Maybe if hybrids hit 30% of the overall USA sales they might feel it, but no state is feeling it now SOLELY because of hybrids.
States are pushing public transportation like it's the best thing since sliced bread - then guess what? Gas tax revenue goes down because people drive less. Duh again.
A hybrid that gets 50 MPG pays half the road tax of the like size car that gets 25 MPG. I think that Congress is anticipating an increase in the percentage of hybrids as an overall percentage of cars on the road. In a state like CA it is already several million dollars per year lost. Mileage tax would be a lot easier than the Oregon solution. You just document your mileage each year when you license the car and pay the mileage tax.
You can bet that Congress will be looking at this in the next session.
A hybrid that gets 50 MPG pays half the road tax of the like size car that gets 25 MPG.
And if everybody drove 50 mpg cars vs. 25 mpg (OR less), our balance of trade, balance of payments, and capitol for internal investment would skyrocket overnight! If we could get off our damned daily Oil Fix, we wouldn’t need to spend $75 + Billion in our favorite country this year let alone next, and next, and next after that If we were running 50% + Ethanol based FFV’s (including hybrids) and the OTR’s were running B100 - 65% of the year, do you really think there would have been a Saddam Hussein, Osama Bin Laden, or Ayatollah Khomeini? Do you think almost 3,000 US citizens would have been sent to heaven in the WTC’s or almost 2,000 American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan? What would we do with all this spare investment capital? Maybe repair roads on our internalized income or on somebody else’s borrowed?
Lastly, what destroys roads, a 1,900 - 3,500 # automobile on 4 wheels or a 60 - 75,000 # one on 18?
Good Luck
Wayne R. Gerdes
The key thing here is "like size car". Any tax of this nature would have to consider the weight of the car in setting the amount of the tax; it would be absurd to charge a Prius (or, even worse, an Insight) the same tax/mile as a Hummer.
jprice SoCal '05 Silver, #1, 9800 miles, [non-permissible content removed]. mileage 48.2MPG
Two things, the 18 wheelers are paying about 10 times as much road tax as the hybrid. There is no way that the 18 wheeler does 10 times as much road damage. In fact I would question if the weight per square inch is as high on the 18 wheeler.
Whatever money would be saved by importing less oil, would not be going into the tax coffers for use on our deteriorating roads. The idea of taxing by the mile is not theory. It is in testing in Oregon right now. It will spread if state governments see a new source of income.
Mileage tax is a fair tax, most are not. It was mentioned on several major news sources today, so it is on the table. Time will tell.
I would agree that it should be based on weight on the road. The same goes for the fact that right now the Prius weight nearly as much as a Camry and only pays half as much tax per mile.
Social engineering at it's finest. It's better than the tax rebates next year because it's of indefinite duration. It's also a kick in the [non-permissible content removed] to get diesel and alternate fuels on the roads NOW!!
There is no way that the 18 wheeler does 10 times as much road damage. In fact I would question if the weight per square inch is as high on the 18 wheeler.
They do more then 10 X’s the road damage as do H2’s, Yukon’s, Sequoia’s, and F350 Powerstrokes to name a few vs. much lighter weight sub’s, compact’s, and midsized automobile cars and trucks
Good Luck
Wayne R. Gerdes
I am open to any evidence to substantiate your claim. I agree that heavier vehicles will impact the road more than lighter vehicles. I just don't buy that it is to the extent you are claiming. In fact I would propose that a large SUV with large footprint tires may have less impact on the road than a lighter car with high pressure low rolling resistant tires.
I have read about truck damage to roads many times Here are just 2 I pulled this morning.
http://fleetowner.com/management/feature/fleet_roads_hell/
There is no doubt, however, that heavy trucks put more stress on roads than cars do. Georgia DOT officials, for example, note that a section of Route 400 that banned trucks lasted two years longer than the section that allowed trucks. Heavily traveled roads like I-95 on the East Coast and I- 5 in the West suffer particularly high truck wear since they haul imported goods from shipping ports to population centers north and south Increase a truck's weight by only 10%, and it causes 40% more wear and tear on pavements, according to Cohen and others.
http://www.detnews.com/2005/specialreport/0510/16/A15-349720.htm
Study finds semis pay as little as 40% of the cost to fix damage, ease congestion they cause.
Good Luck
Wayne R. Gerdes
http://www.suntimes.com/output/auto/car-news-hybrid25.html
Highway experts disagree about what injures roads the most — increased traffic, heavy trucks, weather or poor construction — but they do agree on one thing: There's no way to build roads that last forever, and frequent maintenance is required. They also agree that when a road begins to crumble, the longer you put off repairs, the more expensive it becomes to fix it.
Commercial trucks/rigs are vital to the life of the US economy but there needs to be an impetus to make them cleaner as well. Any vehicle that gets better than 50% more efficiency than the average for it's class should have a reduced tax burden... even heavy trucks.
This leads into the other neverending discussion on Edmunds 'What must GM do etc....'. In their future reduced structure they should concentrate all their efforts on making the 'world truck of the future'. If they let Toyota jump ahead with some spectacular development coming out of San Antonio they will be doomed.
Don't we already do that? The average SUV will pay 2-5 times more road tax than a Prius. PU trucks and SUVs have paid more road tax than cars for at least 25 years. The roads are going to pot "so to speak". Congress is looking for solutions. I think taxing by the mile is the most fair. I'm not convinced that a Prius on little skinny tires pumped up to 50LBs of pressure is not causing more wear to the road than a Hummer with big fat donuts for tires. It has to do with lbs per square inch on the road.
You don’t have to be convinced. Wear is caused from the heavy load vehicles, not the light ones.
If you want to be charged by the mile, I am sure you can find someone in your state that would love to attach a 2-way GPS receiver/transponder to your truck and let it run. I have read of some insurance companies doing this for a slight discount. Go ahead, make your day but leave mine alone
Good Luck
Wayne R. Gerdes
Why choose the Prius? The tire pressure for the Prius is 35/33. It uses 185/65/15 tires which is the same type of tire used in other small cars. If there ever is a bill passed that taxes cars per mile, people will just not care about conserving fuel. You can argue this all you want. It will never ,ever happen.
It is already going on in Oregon. I just think there is an easier way to administer than the GPS device. Under the Oregon system you will pay $.0125 per mile. That is $187 per year if you drive 15k miles. I think it would be much easier to have your odometer read by the DMV and pay the tax when you register each year. I picked the Prius for two reasons. One because this is a hybrid discussion and the Prius is the # 1 hybrid. Second, those that inflate their tires to get the surface area of their tires to the smallest amount, may be damaging the roads more than those that just inflate their tires to the normal pressure.
Again this is not something I brought up. It is all over the news this weekend. Congress is looking for money and they have the fat cat hybrid owners in their sights.
The program is the first step in a long-term plan to replace the state's gasoline tax, which pays for about 40 percent of Oregon 's road projects. As in many states, Oregon officials are worried gas tax revenues won’t be able to keep up with the rising costs of road building, especially with improved mileage from both traditional and hybrid cars.
http://www.stateline.org/live/ViewPage.action?siteNodeId=136&languageId=1&contentId=32957
This supposed law would effect everyone in the same way. What will eventually happen is that the Feds will simply raise the gas tax. I suggest that they raise it at least a buck so I can drive on glass smooth interstates.
ZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzz..... let's talk about something more interesting. I didn't plan any trips for this holiday.
That's not a bad idea. I noticed how nice the roads on Vancouver Island are. I guess in Canada they are using those high gas taxes to keep the roads in good shape.
Nicely done. Reminds me of the billions and billions served at McD's.
You have to love that kind of news for all our sakes Nice find indeed!
I wonder if a Prius owner will eventually host a web cast w/ the live cam on that billboard? Hint Hint
Good Luck
Wayne R. Gerdes
http://www.canadiandriver.com/news/051128-7.htm
Gotta love it!!!
Try it - you might like it!
Two weeks later, Hurricane Rita forced the evacuation of Houston. Cory, 32, stayed behind, but Tiffany, 35, decided to take their 5-year-old son, Presley, to her dad's house in Austin. They left with a nearly full tank of gas two nights before Rita made landfall. "We got caught in traffic almost immediately," says Tiffany. "We were crawling." The usual three-hour trip to Austin stretched to 11 hours, but every time Tiffany stopped, the Accord Hybrid's auto-stop feature shut down the gasoline engine and the electric motor took over. While SUVs lined up to refuel, Tiffany kept going. "I still had half a tank when we pulled into Austin," she says.
http://www.kiplinger.com/personalfinance/features/archives/2005/11/carmain.html
Toyota can do two things:
Buy Solomon
or
PAYUP...
What are your thoughts?
Nice to see everyone working on getting hybrids to market.
In city driving Escape Hybrid must be giving atleast 30 MPG which is 3 times that of Crown Vic / Grand Marq.
Its good for City with reduced pollution.
Good for Cab Drivers since these vehicles will have lesser vibration with engine idling.
Advertisement for riders.
Hope Mariner Hybrid also joins this fleet. After all Escape / Mariner has same cargo
capacity as Crown Vic / Grand Marq.
Last time I went to NYC, I saw a lot of Sienna Minivans, seems gas prices are biting the vehicles
with V8 engines, prompting drivers to move to V6.
Good luck Ford.
If you are interested in reading this very objectively written article further then please refer to the following link in WSJ.com:
WSJ.com
If you have no access then you can refer tp today's Wall Street Journal newspaper dated Nov. 30 . in the Opinion Section.
ENJOY!!!
If that is similar to the rest of the factual errors in the article, I prefer not to read it and WSJ should be ashamed.
Hybrid technology IS INDEED GREEN:
2006 EPA Air Pollution Scores:
Prius 9.5
HCH II 9.5
Cleanest cars listed.
If that ain't green, baby, I don't know what is !!!!
Anybody who prejudges an article without reading it can best be summed up by the following phrase:
"Please Dont Confuse Me With Facts Because I Love Hybrids"