American cars are bigger (longer) and faster. When I've traveled in Europe, I'm always surprised by how small most cars are and how small the parking spots are.
High mpg options exist in the US. Americans seem to prefer to trade gas savings for more power and bigger cars rather than saving some cash, at least at the current price point of gas.
My family keeps growing (in numbers, age and size) and as I'm approaching midlife affordability I would love a decent large SUV, like the Volvo XC90 etc to replace my ageing Ford Focus estate.
But for the life of me, I can't imagine the pain of owning such a large vehicle. Parking would be a nightmare. At home, in town, anywhere. I live in Hampshire in England and the parking spots around here are all designed with 1970s Golfs and Morris Minors in mind it seems so not SUV compatible at all.
I already frequently can only open the door 1/4 of the way and really squeeze my stomach in to get into the car. With a large SUV, I would surely have to enter via the boot all the time. They may only be 5-10cm wider on each side, but that is totally impractical around here.
Tesla-esque self-driving/summoning would really solve this as I could just ask the car to reverse a little before I get in, so parking tightly would then not be a problem. For me at least.
Thankfully SUVs would be 4x4 as I also would surely have to go partially off-road when meeting other cars on the lanes around here.
It makes sense - most of the infrastructure was built before the car. So it's not really feasible to accommodate large vehicles.
It's not even possible for them to put the toilet anywhere other than INSIDE the shower in many places because the apartments are so small. Sometimes they even have "floor urinals". I get a laugh out of it every time but they do have some serious size constraints in many places over there.
The roads? Rights-of-way & property boundaries didn't get bombed, and one narrowing due to right-of-way passing through historical-significant properties restricts the maximum vehicle size for the entire road/region (https://goo.gl/maps/BzJrXer8HmF2)
Consider this local intersection ('junction'): https://goo.gl/maps/UPjtR5VdSXM2. It's a favourite for the practical driving test: from the left lane, turn right into the side street. It's extremely dangerous, as you have to creep around the corner to the left to get visibility of the oncoming 30mph traffic, without getting so far pass the side street's centre line than you can't safely turn in.
High mpg options exist in the US. Americans seem to prefer to trade gas savings for more power and bigger cars rather than saving some cash, at least at the current price point of gas.