Photo exposes major problem for owners of controversial mega trucks taking over Australia
Love them or loath them, the oversized US-style trucks taking over our roads are here to stay.
Another day, another oversized truck dividing opinion.
The controversial vehicle, which has surged in popularity across Australia in recent years, is loved and loathed in equal measures. So when a photo of one of these giant pieces of machinery sticking out of a parking bay inside a car park was shared online, unsurprisingly, two passionate sides emerged.
For one of them, it was infrastructure's fault. Car parks are just not accomodating normal sized vehicles, let alone these American-style behemoths, they argued. And it's hard to disagree. With the mega truck causing a build up of traffic inside the car park thanks to its protruding hood, its quite clear these spaces are just not fit for big vehicles.
"What do you want them to do, park on the ceiling?" one person defensively asked.
"He's done a pretty good job of parking it so give them some slack," another went as far as saying.
And the other side, well we've heard it quite a bit already. "Selfish," one person called the driver.
"These cars belong off road, not around schools, shops, and residential areas," another moaned.
And that's the sentiment in Paris, with authorities deciding to crack down on such vehicles by imposing a parking tax on owners.
Monash University's Dr Julian O'Shea is a well-known critic of the vehicles, and told Yahoo News Australia last year that could well be the way we go, slugging owners extra fees to make their way into the CBD and other high-traffic areas.
Do we need bigger spaces? Plenty of us think so
Dr O'Shea said trying to accomodate these vehicles means we lose space for everything else.
"If we want to make our carparks bigger, we get fewer of them, we lose space for bike lanes, we lose space for parks, we lose space for shops," he argued.
But is a bit more space what the people want? Well if the response to a Yahoo story about larger spaces in a Tasmanian car park is anything to go by, they do. The story was inundated with thousands of responses hailing the idea of the car park's spaces getting a bit more room.
Just expect to see more scenarios like the TikTok video below where motorists are increasingly finding wherever they can to park their vehicle.
And while ute drivers would certainly welcome a change to the size of spaces, one defiant owner of a mega truck told Yahoo this week he can get his prized possession into a standard spot. How he gets in and out of the vehicle however is another question.
Regardless of your view on these giant trucks, one thing is for certain, they're not going anywhere anytime soon.
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