EDMONTON – The Ford F-150 may be the unofficial-official vehicle of Alberta – but one Toronto-based columnist suggests it’s time to ban the sale of pickup trucks for personal use. But how does that fly in this province?
In Alberta, you pretty much can’t go anywhere without seeing a pick-up truck on the road. But as climate change fears deepen, some environmentalists question whether people really need the vehicles outside of work?
CityNews reached out to Davide Mastracci with Passage, who wrote the article “It’s Time To Ban The Sale Of Pickup Trucks” but has yet to receive a response.
CityNews put the question online to gauge how the general public feels about the subject.
The results were closer than one would think.
A recent article (out of Toronto) suggests it's time to ban the sale of pickup trucks for non-work related purposes. To save the environment among other things.
How do my 360 Albertan Twitter followers feel about this? #Yeg #yegtraffic #Alberta https://t.co/xNSIuhC6ir
— Darce Vader (@darcyropchan) July 16, 2021
Many people say they want to have the most fuel-efficient and clean option, but only if it has the power to haul what they need, or spend some time off-road.
But even the author of the piece suggests people don’t really need them for work that badly.
Ryan Hauer runs an electrical company in Edmonton — he says there’s no way he or his employees can get what they need to the job site without a truck.
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“There’s a 10-foot stick of conduit that you need almost every day, you can’t put that in a car or an SUV, you’d have it hanging out the back, but that would be more unsafe than a truck,” said Hauer.
“There’s no electrician, or mechanic or anyone who can fit all of their tools in the back of a car. We’re pretty trades driven here in Alberta.”
Hauer says not only is it necessary to have a truck to navigate the terrain of a job site, as well as keep people safe, but he adds there are smaller vehicles with worse gas mileage.
“I have a low-end sports car that burns more gas than any pick up on our crew, right. So getting rid of trucks because it’s bigger doesn’t make sense according to gas mileage.”
