I think the crash tests are a good idea, but they're not reflective of the vehicle make and model death rate. All we hear are rants about how unsafe small cars are, when, in reality, these statistics are telling us something entirely different that we all should be paying attention to. If we can legislate cars to meet certain crashworthiness and safety standards, why can't we legislate proper defensive driving training for all new drivers as a requirement to obtain a driver's license? We have made it law that our cars need to have their emissions checked every other year after a certain age in order to renew our license plate stickers, but the only time a safety inspection is required is if the car changes ownership.
Whenever someone mentions to me how unsafe they believe a Micra is due to its size, I ask them if they've ever taken a course in defensive driving (so far the answer has been a unanimous no), and when was the last time they had a safety inspection done on their vehicle (never). Then I tell them, based on their answers, they are telling me they don't really care about safety and instead are just being a boor. It might not make me any new friends, but it does give them something to think about.
In our culture obsessed with absurd excess, the Nissan Micra is my counterculture car of choice.
Be sure to visit my blog at
mymicra.com!
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View my fuel log 2015 Micra SV manual: 6.4 L/100 km ... 44.3 mpg (Imp) ... 15.7 km/L ... 36.9 mpg (US) ...