I don't know 'bout where ya'll are, but 'round here it's TRUCK COUNTRY.

At lunch today, I pulled up to a diner to get a bite to eat and out of the 26 vehicles present, (including mine), there were 2 vans, 1 sedan, with the rest being SUVs or full size trucks. Of the SUVs, there was 1 small (Ford Escape), 1 mid (Ford Explorer), and the rest being either Yukon XLs or Expeditions. Now, I was driving a truck also, only because my job requires it, a F-250 with an utility back, definitely not because I wanted to. With all of the high-occupancy vehicles present, I was expecting not to find a seat, but upon entering I did a quick head count an came up with 37. 37? I was expecting more than that, thats only 1.48 persons per vehicle. With gas prices the way they are I would expected some ride sharing going on, guess not.

In situations like this, I always like to think what their reactions would be if I rode up in my MINI (not here yet, but I can still dream ). I own a Miata now, and in situations like these, I usually get looks of disgust from the majority present. Sometimes I get asked, "What kind of car is that? A Geo?" A GEO!!!! PI$$-OFF. That's like when my wife bought her yellow Mazda6 and we went to her parents for a visit, there were other people over visiting and one guy said, "Wow, nice Chevy!" I couldn't reply, I was in shock.

Anyway, back to the point, does driving such a tiny car make you nervous around the giants of the road? I can get nervous in the Miata in a crowd of giants rolling at 85MPH down the I. I suspect, I may not be quite a nervous in the MINI since you sit a little higher, thus making you feel a little larger.

 

It's fine when you're passing them by.

 

Who cares?:impatient I just wave when they need to stop for gas

 

Nope. Never. What does make me feel nervous is driving my parents' Blazer, which has loose steering, is incredibly heavy, and can't corner worth crap. I'll take my safe little MINI, thank you very much!

 

Exactly... I may feel nervous for a second, but then I just drop it a gear and zip by. Its a good feeling .

 

I prefer the handling, braking, and acceleration capability of a MINI to the tonnage. I get tired of the "mutually assured destruction" (younguns: that's a cold war reference) of ever increasing size in the name of "safety".

I'm still waiting on the MINI but drive a small car now and in most cases I feel plenty safe.

 

Coming from an Impala SS, I expected to be nervous in traffic, but in actual practice I was never fazed. I guess it is related to the MINI's agility.

Rawhyde

 

People forget that the MINI is just as wide as most Hondas, Toyotas, and Mazdas, its just a lot shorter. I dont get nervous, I get away from the big trucks, they cant stop as fast, they cant (generaly) accelerate as fast, and certainly cant turn as fast.
Sometimes I play a mental game by imagining the trucks and SUVs have no body, just a chassis and a seat mounted 3 or 4 feet off the ground. I imagine the drivers on their high perches, going around turns, leaning into the curve and holding on to the steering wheel for dear life as 2 or 3 tons of steel try to change direction.

 

One thing the Mini isn't, is that it isn't low to the ground. Its more or less the same seating height as most sedans, so I never feel like I'm in a very small car.

Besides, those SUVs and trucks makes for great pylons on the road :P

 

Let me rephrase. Do you feel nervous about the giants' inability to respond quickly if they come over your way? There's not always an easy exit when that happens. With the Miata, I've always been confident in its capabilities, with its cat-like grace and go-kart moves on the road, but still, I've been moved off of the road more than once with the horn blaring and the other "driver" looking around dumbfounded.

 

I understand that completely! I hate driving my work truck for the same reasons. I've been driving it weekdays for years so you'd think that I would be used to its crappy handling, but like the saying goes, "you can't polish a turd".

 

kackenthorpe, I can sympathize. I live in Myrtle Beach and when the tourist in their giant SUV's aren't in town, the locals with their giant trucks are all over the place. I have gotten a couple of odd looks (I got my MINI last Saturday from Mini of Charleston) and definitely some (positive) comments at a few place, but I have never felt unsafe. If anything, coming from driving SUV's the last 6 years, I feel safer in that no one is going to clip my back end while passing quickly and that I am not going to back up into anything.

 

One of the first aspects of driving a MCSc I appreciated was that I never feel intimidated on the road. Perhaps it is just an aspect of the open top, but in fact I get a kind of "Alice in Wonderland" effect surrounded by lumbering SUVs. (No offense, this is the sensation). The ridiculousness of the sheer size of some of these vehicles is almost cartoonish. Not to say that I am not very careful, being outsized, but the nimbleness of the MINI more than compensates.

My daughter remarked to me last nite in one of our frequent evening motorings, "I never realized how slow everyone else is". This is indeed the effect.

 

... would make anybody nervous! I think all new drivers should be given the opportunity to drive an antique vehicle. It exagerates every bad move, grinding gears tell all, and the brakes teach safe following distance with excitement. So just because it's bigger don't mean it's safer!
The trick to driving a MINI is that it's easy to play keep-away (from me).

 

I wish the MINI was smaller on occasion. So I guess that means, that I don't think its to small around the trucks. I just remember that everyone else on the road could easly do the stupidest possible thing at any given time and I need know I'm safe staying off the phone, two hands on the wheel and ready to react to crazy driving.

 

Since I ordered my MINI on March 9, I've started watching for SUVs that are full of people. One of the justifications for these vehicles is "we need to transport a lot of people"...

now granted some of the windows are too tinted to see the occupants, but in almost two months, I have seen exactly three SUVs with more than two people, and only one where it looked like every seat as full.

Hard to believe that there are so many people commuting in these things every day.

 

My neighbor with the SUV comes over the other day and says "doesn't it bother you to be that close to the ground?" Referring to the mini.

Haven't heard that one before...

 

Ehh, I have a Landrover, so I dont really get nervous passing SUV's. The mini was a BIG difference. A car that is between the 2 is the Mercades ML 500. I had one, and it handles almost as well as the MINI.

 

I've always owned small cars - CRX, GTI, the largest being my 2000 Civic Si - so I feel confident in my car. But, I do worry about the landwhales around me. I can't see around them when they're in front of me, and they make me nervous when they're behind me. Once, in my CRX at a stoplight, a very large F350 barely came to a stop behind me. The grill had a menacing appearance in my rear-view mirror as the weight of the truck shifted upon braking, causing it to jerk up and down, like an attacking dog that had just run out of leash. It scared the hell out of me because I knew, had it not stopped, they'd be picking pieces of my tail lights out of my back.

 

There's this little thing called agility. Excuse the awful reference, but in David vs. Goliath, David will win every time.

 

Ahahahaha! Something about emoticons makes it much more hilarious

 

I had a guy this morning say he was thinking of my car and the gas mileage I get versus his Denali. He just couldn't stop asking questions about my MC. "Especially how can I fit my 6 foot frame in your little car!" I just explained all the little benifits about the MINI.

 

My other car is a motorcycle...
I've gotten used to driving (riding) defensively, assuming every idiot out there has 95% of their attention divided between their latte and their cell phone 4% on their destination and about 1% on the road. I also take into account that the average driver has sailboat fuel between the ears (couldn't hit sand if they fell off a camel--catcher for the javelin team--wheel's goin' round but the hamster's dead--you know).
Nervous? No. I use the MINI's agility to keep space around me. It also helps that my comute is about 4 miles long

 

Like others have mentioned, just presume that everyone in their Dreadnoughts around you are the stupidest people to ever see daylight. Presume that they are applying makeup, watching their iPod video, or typing an email (i've seen all of this from SUV drivers in the past 30 days) while rolling along at 80+ mph. Presume they don't see you - that they are not paying any attention to anything around them. Motorcycle riders, so I am told, always approach traffic with this mindset. I've been motoring for over 26k miles now, and while there have been a few close calls, I haven't been run over yet *knocks on wood*

 

Some SUVs actually get closer to the ground than the MINI, but only when they're rolling over. Now that would bother me!