I’m not sure I’d want to do 45 in that thing, hell of a way to go if you got speed wobbles. I could see a use for kei vehicles in downtown areas. Traffic is so bad that a car’s top speed might be 30 if you are lucky. Mass transit, bikes and tiny vehicles are what most people could easily get away with day to day.
Oddly enough my state made UTV’s(side by sides) street legal and that opened up the legality of kei trucks and the such being street legal here. One of my coworkers has something like this.
Not entirely sure how long that’s going to last. They’ve already threatened removing that law because people are abusing the hell out of it. They had to do an education campaign because people just thought you could take them on the road. They need to be licensed, registered and insured to the same standards as a car…aka at least liability to state minimums.
They can’t go on any road over 45mph(even though a lot of the nicer ones can go much faster). It was kind of comical to see the number of roads that went from 45 to 50 because of this.
Red light? I’m in an off-road UTV! Hop this curb, go over the side walk and make my right turn! Not to mention the jack assess that have their 50” 40,000 lumen light bars on the roof blasting at ALL TIMES.
That and one city had $350K of damage done to a park because somebody thought doing doughnuts in the fields was a good idea. Much harder to do if you have to trailer it there first.
I’m mostly in favor of it but the people outright breaking the law need to be dealt with. There are some safety concerns I have with it as well. Those vehicles are not safety tested. Even a small sedan would make an absolute mess of them in most accidents. That’s fine if you are making that decision consciously. The amount of people that load up their entire family and kids in these things is alarming though. Sometimes kids that would need a car seat in a car but it’s a UTV!
Well that comment got a lot longer than I was planning. I’d love a kei car for around town though. I’m aware of the risks…it’s not worse than my motorcycle.
I’m not sure I’d want to do 45 in that thing, hell of a way to go if you got speed wobbles. I could see a use for kei vehicles in downtown areas. Traffic is so bad that a car’s top speed might be 30 if you are lucky. Mass transit, bikes and tiny vehicles are what most people could easily get away with day to day.
Oddly enough my state made UTV’s(side by sides) street legal and that opened up the legality of kei trucks and the such being street legal here. One of my coworkers has something like this.
Not entirely sure how long that’s going to last. They’ve already threatened removing that law because people are abusing the hell out of it. They had to do an education campaign because people just thought you could take them on the road. They need to be licensed, registered and insured to the same standards as a car…aka at least liability to state minimums.
They can’t go on any road over 45mph(even though a lot of the nicer ones can go much faster). It was kind of comical to see the number of roads that went from 45 to 50 because of this.
Red light? I’m in an off-road UTV! Hop this curb, go over the side walk and make my right turn! Not to mention the jack assess that have their 50” 40,000 lumen light bars on the roof blasting at ALL TIMES.
That and one city had $350K of damage done to a park because somebody thought doing doughnuts in the fields was a good idea. Much harder to do if you have to trailer it there first.
I’m mostly in favor of it but the people outright breaking the law need to be dealt with. There are some safety concerns I have with it as well. Those vehicles are not safety tested. Even a small sedan would make an absolute mess of them in most accidents. That’s fine if you are making that decision consciously. The amount of people that load up their entire family and kids in these things is alarming though. Sometimes kids that would need a car seat in a car but it’s a UTV!
Well that comment got a lot longer than I was planning. I’d love a kei car for around town though. I’m aware of the risks…it’s not worse than my motorcycle.