The engines rev, the guitars thrum and a gruff narrator lays out why the vehicle occupying the driveway is more than just a machine. “A truck is a tool,” he says, “but a Ram – a Ram is life.”
So begins an advert for the Ram 1500, a pickup truck slightly bigger than the Panzer I tanks of Nazi Germany and almost as heavy. It is growing in popularity in Europe, with the number of Rams arriving on the continent up 20% in 2023 from the year before, according to registration data from the European Environment Agency. Road safety and environmental campaigners in the UK and Europe are aghast as the latest, most extreme cases of North American car bloat – giant pickup trucks – are increasingly crossing the Atlantic.
“Europe should ban the Ram,” said Dudley Curtis from the European Transport Safety Council. “This type of vehicle is excessively heavy, tall and powerful, making it lethal in collisions with normal-sized vehicles, pedestrians and cyclists.”
Nah, that’s usually the person driving it.
The thing is, a truck is a tool, or used to be at least. I had an old little Toyota truck. Two seats and could haul as much construction materials or debris as any one person could manage.
These trucks are impossible to work with. Massive cabs that shorten the bed, lifted frames with beds that break your back loading stuff, terrible fuel economy. They’re as much about utility as lacy underwear.