Talk:Passenger vehicles in the United States

message: Please leave suggestions in sections below and then revise the outline
General Blueprint for this article:
#Summary
#Passenger vehicles in the US
##Statistics:Overview with graphs and references to sources (in lieu of long tables and citing raw data), historic development, comparison with other developed countries, explanation of differences and trends.
###Total number of cars and past/current trends started
###Car per licensed driver started
###Cars per 1,000pop started
###Cars per 1,000pop, cars per licensed driver started
###Age of vehicles in operation started
###Pricing of vehicles started
###Fuel consumption started
###Body styles coming
###Retention rate coming
###Comparison with other developed economies, discussion of differences and peculiarities. - I wonder whether drivers should be discussed here or in a separate section. (probably)
##Regulations (CAFE, EPSA, NHTSA, car vs. truck etc.)
##Market (overall sales and historic development, segments, domestic vs. foreign, cars vs. trucks, average prices and whatnot)
#Automotive industry in the US
##Historical perspective coming
##Present day started
###Domestic vehicleA discussion of the different meanings of this term
###The Big ThreeA description of what the Big Three are (a kingdom for a good reference to the origins of the term)
###GM started
###Ford started
###(Daimler-)Chrysler started
###Other manufacturers present in the US (with short description of mfg. activity and its history)
#Car culture
##The car and the American way of life
##The car in popular American culture and on TV/movies
#See also
#References
Above is my suggestion for the outline of this articles- I welcome your input and suggestions. Regards, Signaturebrendel 02:06, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The above now contains mine :D Bravada, talk - 10:17, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Good, it revised the outline a bit so we don't have any sub-sub-sub section like (1.2.2.3), I kept all your suggestions and made a little revision. Signaturebrendel 17:53, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

text: Great, but puhleeeze keep the "stats" section readable and involving. I think of "statistics" as a working name only! Bravada, talk - 18:53, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm doing my best, but please feel free to flesh out those sections a bit more. Signaturebrendel 19:04, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Outline and possible future expansion

message: As a non-native English speaker and terrible speller I find this a rather important problem - this article is being developed quite rapidly and in some sections spelling really could use a brush-up, and I can tell that even with my limited English knowledge (e.g. integret part of the American automobile indutry). May I suggest we use some spell-checker before saving edits? Besides, one thing that keeps recurring is corperation - AFAIK, it's corporation. Bravada, talk - 10:17, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, that's a good idea ;-) Signaturebrendel 17:42, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Spellchecking

message: I am very happy to see good, modern-style references in this article, but I think the  template is not used properly with regard to the description ("title") of the page referenced - Template talk:Cite web#Examples contains, well, examples :D of how to use this field. For example, "FoMoCo" is hardly a clear description of the page it links to, I guess it should say "Ford Motor Company corporate site". If there's a specific section or piece of information being linked to, the example page here contains examples how to deal with that. Thanks. Bravada, talk - 10:17, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, I have changed that. Those kind of things are still subject to change. Signaturebrendel 17:43, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: References

message: Gerd and everybody else, how about using this Template:Inuse template to indicate somebody's working on the article at the moment and avoid edit conflicts? Secondly, may I suggest not putting any more "narrative stats" and try to arrange them in a more useful and readable format now? I mean, a number is of little use unless put in a relative (like compared to other countries) or temporal perspective, and explained in terms of causes and/or consequences? We will have to do it anyway! Bravada, talk - 18:33, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, I have treid to make the text more readable in the Sales section. (I do see your point) The problem is that when discussing sales, average age and driver/car ratios in the Statistics section I find it difficult to minimize my use of numbers. I think as the article grows more non-statistical sections will be added. I see what I have written so far as the skelleton. And statistics arn't that bad of a skelleton. FYI: I didn't even know about that template, Thanks for telling me! Also, I'm going to be done for the next few hours, so you can have at it and there'll be no editing conflicts. Thanks. Regards, Signaturebrendel 19:01, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Template 

message: Overall there were an estimated 243,023,485 registered passenger vehicles in the United States in the year 2004.[3] Since 1960 this number has increased steadily, along with the average age of vehicles, indicating a growing number of vehicles per household.
The first statement is obviously daft. You can't estimate the number of passenger vehicles to the nearest unit in a whole year: after all, it changes every second. If some "source" purports to give such a precise number for the number in existence in a whole year (as opposed to, say, the number registered at a particular instant during the year), that source is daft too.
Secondly, I don't understand why the increasing number indicates an increasing number per household. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. But to show that it's true, you'd need to show changes in the number of households, and unless I've missed something, the article does not.
And a general point: I'd thought buses and railroad cars were passenger vehicles. Was I wrong? -- Hoary 08:50, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay, according to the US Departement of Transportation which is the source for the entire article's statistics does not call buses or railroads passenger vehicles. Second, the number of households is mentioned several times througout the article, and as to "You can't estimate the number of passenger vehicles to the nearest unit"- this is not an estimate but the number of vehicles registered, these are statistics from the Federal Government. The government published its statistics in a like-wise manner. You are right though clearly the number changes througout the year. Nontheless it gives quite a good idea of how many cars there were. As to the ratio of vehicles per household, the fact that both average of veicles and the increasing number of them does indicated that households are now in the possions of more vehicles than ever before. There are more cars, yet they are older. Why? Becuase people keep there old ones and keep buying new ones at the same time. The entire statistics and number of househols are listed right in the first section. Hope this helps! Regards, Signaturebrendel 16:30, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: First, the meaning of passenger vehicle. Both my native competence in (admittedly un-American) English and the US English dictionaries that I have at hand say that the word vehicle has strong connotations of "on land" -- while a boat or plane can be a "vehicle", it normally isn't -- but make buses and railroad cars just as much vehicles as cars are. Perhaps the title should be Passenger vehicles in the United States (as defined by the US Department of Transportation); or, much more concisely, Cars in the United States. (Cars in the latter would include trucks used as cars; for convenience's sake, below I'll refer to the combination of both as "cars".) What does your preferred English dictionary tell you that vehicle means? ¶ Second, precision versus reality. To give a good idea of the number of cars (together with trucks used as cars; ), you could just say "243M", minus the spurious precision added by the US DoT. ¶ Third, households, etc. If the number and age of cars is increasing, this might indeed be for the reasons that you give, but you don't prove this and I suspect that it's not true. You say that the number of households is listed in the first section, but I can't see it. My guess is that the increasing number and age of cars results from a number of factors: (i) the increasing number of households, (ii) the impoverishment of the lower and lower middle classes, (iii) a diminution of interest in cars among Americans in general and young males in particular. NB I merely put this forward as a guess; right now I lack the time to hunt down the facts, but I'd point out that the article also lacks facts on how the number of households has changed over time. -- Hoary 01:53, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay, the US Departement of Transportation is the highest authority on the issue- the word cars would exclude SUVs and pick-ups which contstitute a great percentage of the passenger vehicle population. Yes, vehicle means inldues railroads, but passenger vehicles is commonly used to refer to what you call cars. The increasing number of cars per households is proven through the statistics included in the referenced statistics, you can clearly see there are more cars per household now than ever before. "I'd point out that the article also lacks facts on how the number of households has changed over time"- not true, the table clearly states the number of households in millions for all years since 1960. Regards, Signaturebrendel 02:06, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: "vehicles": I'd concede that the US DoT is the highest authority for how it cares to use the term "passenger vehicles". Let's keep non-US English out of this US-specific article, so my own native but non-US intuition doesn't count. I suggest using a US dictionary to find the meaning. The US dictionary I looked at doesn't even hint that a train or bus is less of a vehicle than a car is. Which dictionary do you use, and what does it say? Or do you think that the US DoT is a better guide to usage than a dictionary is? ¶ number of households: You say, the table clearly states the number of households in millions for all years since 1960. Are we looking at different tables? I see a table titled Vehicle and population ratios since 1960. This has a column for Population. It says nothing about households. Please tell me where this article tells the reader about the changing numbers of households. -- Hoary 06:53, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

text: Okay, I have changed it to vehicles per capita, I got households and popultion confused in my post above-Sorry. "Do you think that the US DoT is a better guide to usage than a dictionary is"- That is what I was assuming as the DoT creates the termonology used by the government for policy and taxation. While dicitionaires may differ in their definition, in the end its up to the DoT to decide what is what. Let me know if the change I made to the intro helps. Signaturebrendel 15:47, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Now we're starting to make some progress. Here's my own suggested version (with footnotes temporarily stripped):
-- Hoary 09:04, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

text: Okay, that's a good way of clarifing what the article encompasses. I put the headliner you suggested into place. Signaturebrendel 16:47, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: First paragraph

message: I would like to inform you that, as I said previously, I have submitted this article under GA review at WP:GA/R. My aim is to collect opinions of users previously NOT involved in either editing or nominating/promoting/delisting this article. Please do not turn it into a copy of the discussion we have just had here. Bravada, talk - 12:23, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well seeing it as we disagree on how this article meets the GA criteria and independent review is the best and perhaps the only solution ;-) (That's why I made a peer review request weeks ago) Signaturebrendel 16:34, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I've delisted this article for reasons posted here: GA Disputes --The Talking Sock talk contribs  15:30, 21 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Under review

message: There are a number of problems with the current version of this article. The article.. 
* doesn't seem to carry a neutral point of view in spots;
* carries an overlong discussion of the long discussion about "Domestics vs. Imports" which really belabors the point; 
* makes a few specious claims, such as "there is no actual definition of the term 'Import vehicle.'" In fact, there are legal and regulatory definitions for the term, and there are respected authorities that cover the Automotive Industry (i.e., beyond Wikipedia) that certainly have defined the term.
* makes a few inaccurate statements, such as "due to the national origin of its manufacturer, all Toyotas carry a Vehicle Identification Number (VIN) identifying them as import vehicles." Not true! And the "footnote" doesn't prove the point, and isn't even an authoritative source.
As far as the NPOV issue, the article purports to talk about Automobiles (Passenger vehicles) in the United States but concentrates on a lot of negatives; doesn't talk much about why (or even whether) Americans love the automobile; doesn't talk about the cultural relationship between Americans and their cars: (Route 66, 1957 Chevies, Drag Racing, NASCAR, car culture and customization, convertibles?) It's all "land yachts" and "fuel economy" right now.
Flagged for both NPOV and factual cleanup.  Anybody interested in tackling? I will make a stab in a few days. hadley 2007-03-27.
:I originally wrote the article and agree that there is room for improvement. Please feel free to "take a stab at it." As for the import/export controversy please consider that there may be a difference between the legal definition and the vernacular usage of the term. "Import" and "Export" are ambigous terms, as they are not always used in accord with the legal definition- that needs to be mentioned in the article. Also, the article isn't just land-yachts (which I personally love to drive btw) and milage-it also talks about how many cars there are, how old they tend to be, how much they tend to cost. What is really lacking is a section about car culture. I just haven't had the time or will to do the research yet-so I encourage you to add something on car culture-something that should definitely be mentioned here (after all so many people-including myself-adore their cars) Signaturebrendel 04:27, 28 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: There were some major factual problems with the "import vehicle" section which I have tackled, with some citations.  Hope that helps. Blackplate 04:03, 31 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok, I wasn't aware of "major factual problems," but your edits have definitely improved the article. Thanks for your effort! Regards, Signaturebrendel 05:24, 31 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Current Article Quality (March 2007)

message: I have added the metric conversion of fuel consumption to the table in the article, as is required in the WP:MOS. I admit that I had to check the accuracy of those figures, it is amazing that the average US car needs 13.7 litres of fuel to travel 100 kilometres (17.1 MPG), but it is true! In the EU we will need to travel at least 5 L/100 km (47 MPG) for petrol cars, and 4.5 L/100 km (52 MPG) for diesel cars, by 2012. Many are complaining that this target is too lenient. 81.155.125.119 (talk) 20:54, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the conversion - yes, there is quite the divide between the U.S. & EU (even Canada is quite different). Regards, Signaturebrendel 00:17, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Fuel consumption table

message: I'm interested to know whether there is data on the number of years it takes to turnover the U.S. fleet of automobiles or perhaps some sort of half-life figure (i.e., assuming that consumer tastes shift to more fuel efficient models how long does it take for less fuel efficient models to be completely removed from operation). Jaedglass (talk) 15:27, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Age of vehicles in operation

message: I maintain that the title of this article is misleading. I refer to "Passenger" vehicles in the title. I propose that this article should be revised as "Vehicles in the United States".
The US government shows 253,639,386 for 2012 and this consists of all motor vehicles including those not generally considered as "passenger" vehicles. Here are the six vehicle types included in that number:
1). Light duty vehicle, short wheel base (defined by the US government as a replacement for the old category "Passenger car"; this includes "passenger cars, light trucks, vans and sport utility vehicles with a wheelbase equal to or less than 121 inches").
2). Motorcycle
3). Light duty vehicle, long wheel base (defined by the US government as "large passenger cars, vans, pickup trucks, and sport/utility vehicles with wheelbases larger than 121 inches")
4). Truck, single-unit 2-axle 6-tire or more
5). Truck, combination (most common of this is "semi trucks"; any vehicle combining a large truck with one or more semi trailers)
6). Bus
Jhedges (talk) 16:17, 19 February 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  The title 

message: Why does Chrysler have the largest section on this article? It is "one of the most important" automakers, how, exactly? Crystler isn't even in the top ten largest automakers (world wide production). Toyota and Hyundai are larger, yet they are relegated to "other" and have MUCH smaller descriptions. The idea that Crystler is somehow American yet Toyota is somehow not is just plain wrong. Crystler is owned by the Italians now. This article seems imbalanced toward "American" automakers, especially the smallest Big Three "American" automaker (which is actually Italian). 
I just find that very strange and imbalanced. It does not mention that Toyota sells the most American made car in the United States, but continues to perpetuate the myth that the "American" automakers are the only domestic producers. I honestly dislike Toyota quite a bit, but even I do not think that seems very far… I find it even more unfair that Tesla was excluded from the "Domestic vehicles" section, which says only the Big Three automakers are domestic. Why is Tesla indirectly marked "Import" even though the company was founded in the US, builds cars only in the US, and will soon manufacture batteries in the US? I will add Tesla Motors to the Domestic sections, even though I find the current article to be fundamentally flawed. Zagadka314 (talk) 13:08, 25 November 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Issues with balance? 

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thread_title:  External links modified