How different are European cars from American cars?
It doesn’t take one to be an automobile expert to point out the differences between European cars and American cars. But one does need to understand the difference in sensibilities, requirements and histories of the two great lands to truly gauge why and how different European cars are from American cars.
Let us start with a few basics, which you may or may not be aware.
- European cars are smaller than American cars. You would find more compact cars or hatchbacks and sedans in Europe while you would see more SUVs and hummers, trucks and vans. Europe has smaller roads, obviously being home to many older cities of the world. They don’t have as staggeringly big highways or arterial roads as in American cities. Even the lanes of a neighborhood in a remote town in the United States will be substantially larger than some of the important avenues in major European cities. Naturally, you cannot have overly big or large cars on European roads. Also, Americans love everything to be big. Americans would want space for the luggage of the entire family and they would want to be on the road with as much spatial comfort as possible.
- European cars are much more sophisticated than American cars. In the process, European cars excel in design. American cars are stylish and contemporary but when it comes to design and other finer elements, they don’t stand a chance against their European brethren. Americans are more likely to look for utility in a car but Europeans will focus just as much on the overall design and aesthetics. Europeans need to feel proud of their car’s appearance and how others perceive it as. It must be noted that owing to space constraints, European car makers are compelled to work on more intricate and often complicated designs to have enough jus in a small model.
- America may have presented to the world that it is the home of need for speed enthusiasts but that is an irony in itself. America is indeed in need for speed because of the speed limits. Europe has much more lenient speed limits. As a result, American cars are slower and European cars excel at high speeds. American cars have very poor handling at high speeds. European cars would be a smooth sail.
- American cars are mostly automatic while Europeans prefer the stick variant. European cars offer better mileage and they last longer than American cars.