Man, you guys are not doing a good job at all convincing me we should get an SUV! (Thanks for putting up the good fight, Shagnasty!)
It’s a very good point about the increased storage room and how if we’re going camping the storage space is a Big Deal, especially if we’re going to be lugging a bunch of baby stuff around too.
I don’t think my husband wants an SUV to be macho and cool. He’s not that kind of guy. He’s pretty secure in his manliness, as far as I can tell. But I do think he has a strong perception, probably left over from our childhoods, that a minivan isn’t suitable to do anything outside of suburban neighborhoods (which, honestly, the minivan my parents owned probably wasn’t).
Most people aren’t really enthusiasts. The largest volume sellers have always been bland middle of the road vehicles. Is a minivan or a crossover any less exciting than a Toyota Camry, or a Ford Taurus to go back a few years? And sport wagons were a distinct minority, remember Chevy Caprice Wagons, Buick Roadmaster Wagons, and the Ford equivalent? They were always dull cars to drive.
Infant seats and toddler seats have gotten enormous. I have an 18 month old and his car seat is amazingly big. It is much larger than the one his almost seven year old brother had. The damn thing takes up more than a third of the back seat. And kids have to ride in a booster seat in Virginia until they are eight.
Oh, and also thank you to everyone who mentioned the idea to rent an SUV if we think we’ll need the clearance. That sounds very sensible!
Hee. But, I mean, it’s also true that an (un)happy husband leads to an (un)happy life. I want us both to be happy!
There are only four of us, but it’s conceivable we may have to do carpools, say, once a week or so, that involve seating five people in the car. Four of them in car seats, bleah, which means (as I see Caffeine.addict has pointed out) they really take up more seating than that (two car seats effectively take up all three seats in our sedan).
Huh, I grew up one of four kids and we had various station wagons with “way back” seats and minivans. I can’t really think of any way that the minivans were not superior to the wagons as far as comfort, hauling, and versatility. Maybe the vans got a bit worse gas mileage.
If the OP is joining the school carpool that extra row is going to be used on a regular basis. The third row in a minivan is easier to access and will be more roomy when it occasionally gets used by adults than the third row on all but the largest SUVs.
I was gonna say, that tactic isn’t gonna work here.
Also, a second kid doubles the total space you need for gear when you go camping. Not sure why; you’d think it’s just be another backpack full of clothes, a little bit more food, and another sleeping bag, but nope! God forbid you have a 3rd kid; you’d have to buy a full-size van, and they don’t make Econolines any more.
Well, comparing 1970s-1980s vehicles with modern vehicles is not exactly apples-to-apples. And if you were riding in wagons with three-row seating in those days they were probably American, and it was the worst period in history for US cars.
Station wagons are lighter and less top-heavy than minivans (or SUVs, for that matter). That means they are faster, brake better, are more fuel efficient, and ride better.
Caffeine.addict, I take your point about enthusiasts. But even the most “this is for going from A to B” person in the world can tell the difference.
Wanted to share this excerpt from Kim Stanley Robinson’s 2005 novel Fifty Degrees Below in which one of the scientists at the National Science Foundation decides to become homeless and goes car shopping…
So long story short, if you plan on being homeless, a van -specifically the Honda Odyssey- is the obvious choice.
I love my Outback, I take it skiing, camping, biking, kayaking, etc, but it has nothing compared to the space in a mini-van, especially if you’re putting more than 2 people in it.
The cool wagons were always a minority, and hopefully they will survive. However, the wagons that were killed off were the people and kid haulers that were enormous, beasts with poor acceleration, handling, and fuel economy. Personally, I wish that the Volvo V70 had worked for us.
They may notice the difference, but I don’t think that they care. Someone is buying all of those crossovers to the point that there is a decline in sales for mid size cars.
No, you’re right. The only Subaru that had available 3rd row seats was the now-defunct Tribeca and those were appallingly small even by the standards of small SUV 3rd row seats.
ETA: Although Subaru does supposedly have a new 7-passenger SUV in the works in the next year or two so if this is going to be a long shopping process that might be worth looking out for.
Yeah, if we get a minivan we are seriously going for the automatic doors. I would have loved to have those when Daughter was three and daily getting super frustrated with opening and closing the heavy (to her) car doors.
We have a Suburban and had a mini-van for about 6 months. The Suburban is used for hauling the camper or boat, pulling people out of ditches and for the XMas trip to the in-laws (to have room to haul presents). Plus the occasional towing the pick-up box trailer of tree trimmings.
The mini-van we sold pretty quickly. I did not like how low it sat compared to my conversion vans yet was a bit taller than any of our sedans. It also had car side mirrors vs nice big truck ones. And I really didn’t notice it having much room for hauling stuff.
Neither of them allow(ed) for easy access to the third row for a fat older woman… unlike the conversion vans. The only downside to the conversion vans is that they seat 7 people vs 8. But back when I had 2 kids in carseats the passenger captain’s chairs were much easier to get kids in and out of than any other vehicle we have owned (which included a station wagon). Plus if you laid the back seat down and took out the second row chairs you could haul a king sized bed with no problem.
I’m going to miss Brown Bessie… as she is getting trundled off to that big scrapheap in the sky this fall. After being stripped for anything useful to keep the Red Baron still chugging on. When he dies I will probably just get a car to drive since the need for hauling 3 kids around will be gone (the youngest is 14 so he’ll be wanting to drive himself places soon enough).
I had a minivan until I stopped driving my kids around and then I got a crossover.
What the minivan did better than the crossover :
seat 7 with room for cargo. And even though there are only four, I often needed to seat more than four people - carpools to my son’s baseball games, taking friends or cousins along on outings, etc.
When the third seat is up in the crossover , it still seats only six and has no cargo space. And even small adults can’t fit comfortably in the third row of my crossover, but the third row in my minivan had just as much space as the second.
transport sheetrock, IKEA furniture ,etc. Crossover is too small to fit that stuff easily. Sometimes I end up sliding a box between the seat and the door or between the driver and the passenger.
What the crossover does better than the minivan:
Times have changed; all the people wanting to avoid looking lame all bought SUVs, so they are now lame. When I think of the stereotypical “soccer mom” today, I imagine her driving an enormous SUV. And a crossover is pretty much just a station wagon with a lift kit.
Slight hijack for a second: Are all minivans FWD or do some of them have AWD?
OP, I think SUV vs. minivan would also depend on where you live. I’m drawn to SUV’s simply that’s what I’ve had for the past 12 years and because of where I live – FWD vehicles are no match for snow and ice. Minivans don’t have the clearance a SUV has.
Also your last point is not necessarily accurate. The Toyota Sienna minivan for instance has higher ground clearance than Toyota’s small SUV, the RAV4.
(Thanks for putting up the good fight, Shagnasty!)