hatchbacks

At a recent environmental conference, I met up with several graduate students from all over the country: east coast, southwest, northwest, and midwest. Everybody had some experience with environmental consulting. And everybody whose car was less than 5 years old had a hatchback or small wagon. I believe the lineup went something like focus, yaris, matrix, 3 (mazda), golf, focus.

It’s not surprising – hatchbacks are relatively cheap, can park anywhere (and a small turning radius is a huge help when you keep missing turns on your way to a new field site), don’t use much gas, hold a lot of field gear (although my particular storage criterion was a standard Christmas tree), and for people of a certain age, they don’t carry any particular stigma. You can get one with all-wheel drive, too. If you’re a more, ah, engaged driver, you can compromise on the mileage and the cost and get more of a pocket rocket. My car was the latter. I had a great deal of fun when I first bought my car and nobody knew what it was. It’s always amusing to surprise teenagers who seem to think that stickers and a spoiler make a car go faster.

Hatchbacks make sense for field folks. If you’re in a field that involves working outside for relatively low pay, you’re more likely to pick practicality over luxury when you’re car shopping. And as I’ve mentioned before, I don’t consider SUVs to be necessarily practical. With that being said, if my car dies tomorrow and I win the lottery, I would get something like this:

(Mercedes B200 sports turbo)

Oh yeah. You can’t get it in the US. Ok, so if I won the lottery, I’d keep my car and get a non-field car.

(audi R8)

Mm…head-turning, mid-car engine, all-wheel drive, and at just breaking 6 figures, semi-affordable compared to some other exotics.

Of course, I’d need a house with a garage for it. So I’d need to win a really big lottery.

Note: I have a long weekend of travelling, so I won't have a new post on Monday. Also, I added a "driving" tag, since I seem to discuss it a lot.