WSJ: SUVs in Chicago

["Matt & Jenai" <matjen@xsite.net>]

Per another listers suggestion, here is the WSJ article about SUVs in
Chicago.

Sport-Utility Vehicles Are Buried
Under the Test of Chicago Snow
By ROBERT BERNER and CALMETTA Y. COLEMAN
Staff Reporters of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

CHICAGO -- The record-breaking snow that fell on this city Saturday offered
thousands of sport-utility vehicles their first chance to surmount an
obstacle bigger than a speed bump. The results, alas, don't all resemble a
Jeep Grand Cherokee commercial.
Adrienne Jankelow's first four-wheel-drive experience in her rugged Mercury
Mountaineer (price tag: $35,000) ended with the 34-year-old real-estate
agent's phone plea to her brother: "Come dig me out."
By the hundreds, the very vehicles that in ads scale steep mountainsides and
cruise across oceans of snow have been getting stuck in the streets of
Chicago. And the damage hasn't been limited to pride and $200 towing
charges. Many stuck drivers are spinning their wheels so furiously that they
burn out their transmissions, or worse.

Jeep Grand Cherokee

"Some people have basically destroyed" their vehicles, says David Hessing,
president of A-1 Towing Service in the Chicago suburb of Niles. "They think
that just because they've got four-wheel-drives they can drive right through
18 inches of snow."
It was inevitable that the largest snow-storm in 30 years in Chicago -- at
more than 20 inches it was the biggest single-day accumulation ever -- would
be a test. Never has so much snow fallen on so many four-wheel-drive
vehicles. Like urbanites across the country, Chicagoans have gone wild in
recent years over the type of truck traditionally used by ranchers and other
rugged types. The trend is so hot that during one month last year, sales of
light trucks, which include sport-utility vehicles, actually outpaced those
of cars, and nearly every auto maker has rolled out some sort of
four-wheel-drive model.
But city roads can pose bigger problems than ranch roads. One reason is
snowplows. The snow they remove from the center of a street forms walls on
either side that imprison parked cars. So, before Trina Kakacek and her
husband could engage their four-wheel-drive Jeep Wrangler, they had to grab
shovels and dig it out. "No way could you drive it over that snowbank," says
Ms. Kakacek, a Chicago swim coach.
Attempting to do so can be a mistake, as Ruben Ramos found out. After he
pulled his 1988 Jeep Wrangler up to a Walgreens drugstore near Chicago to
buy some washer fluid, a plow came down the street and pushed up a 4-foot
wall of snow, blocking the exit.
"I tried to go though the snowdrift and I got stuck," says the 30-year-old
photographer. "Then my axle broke in half and the tire almost came off." The
tow truck that hauled the vehicle away dropped Mr. Ramos off at the church
where he was to photograph a wedding.
Such experiences are amusing to those who dislike sport-utility vehicles.
"SUVs are fuel-slurping metallic objects that block my view in traffic, and
it's a sad day for them in Chicago," says Sam Mintani, features editor for
Road & Track magazine, which mainly writes about sports cars.
But sport-utility enthusiasts counter that the problem is the driver, not
the vehicle. "You can generally maneuver through all kinds of conditions
with a four-wheel drive," says Trent Riddle, editor of 4 Wheel Drive & Sport
Utility magazine. But, he adds, "a four-wheel drive vehicle is not a tank,
and even a tank can get stuck."
A rule of thumb, Mr. Riddle says, is that the wheels need to touch a firm
surface. So drivers attempting to push their way through mounds of snow
should be sure they have enough clearance to maintain traction.
Four-wheel-drive manuals often provide explicit warnings about driving
slowly when that function is engaged, and about using caution when the
wheels spin or otherwise encounter resistance. "When you are stuck, you've
got to accept the fact that you are stuck," says Greg Urban, service
director at Land Rover of Hinsdale, a Chicago suburb.
A Good Tradeoff
But many don't. Over the weekend, Mr. Urban's dealership towed in one Range
Rover and two Land Rovers whose drivers had burned out their transmissions
trying to get unstuck. "That's drivers' abuse," says Mr. Urban. "It's worth
paying $200 to get towed out rather than a $4,000 damage bill and still have
to get towed out."
Those who use their four-wheel-drive vehicles off-road aren't surprised that
city drivers -- whom they deride as "pavement pounders" -- are taking some
wrong turns. "They have a sports utility ... for the prestige, but they
don't know how to drive it," says Kathleen Snyder, office manager for the
United Four Wheel Drive Associations, an international group of
four-wheel-drive enthusiasts.
Of course, with some of these vehicles selling for as much as $66,000, no
wonder some people are mistaking "all terrain" for "invincible." A common
mistake is to think that sport-utility vehicles aren't subject to slipping
and sliding under snowy conditions. Three wrecked SUVs have been towed into
O'Hare International Autobody since Saturday, one a $38,000 Range Rover with
$13,000 in damage. Other auto-repair shops report towing in wrecked SUVs as
well. "With four-wheel drive they can go like heck, but they don't stop any
faster," says Rick Larson, body-shop manager at Knauz Motors in the Chicago
suburb of Lake Forest.
The mighty machines share another problem with their more-timid
counterparts: batteries susceptible to cold weather. Tow companies across
Chicago report hauling in SUVs with dead batteries.
Occupational Hazard
And towing an SUV can in itself be a problem. Ones with full-time four-wheel
drive can't be hooked up to a regular tow truck because the rolling of the
rear wheels would start the front wheels turning, which could cause the SUV
to climb up the back of a tow truck. So towing companies must load the
vehicles onto flatbed trucks.
Even for expert four-wheelers, the city poses special problems. Many Chicago
residential streets are narrow and one-way, so every time a two-wheel-drive
car got stuck over the weekend, it essentially paralyzed several
sport-utility vehicles behind it. Also, snowbanks have narrowed two-way
streets to a single lane, "and if you're in the sport utility, you're always
the one who has to back up when you meet another car, because the other car
can't," says Ms. Kakacek.
Of course, many SUV owners have had no problem at all. Katherine Brennan, a
Chicago real-estate agent, took out her Toyota Rav4 during the height of the
storm Saturday morning and got around just fine. At long last, the big
premium she had paid for a four-wheel-drive vehicle paid off. "It was the
first time I got to do that in the three years since I've owned this thing,"
she says. "It was fun."
Seeing people in two-wheel-drive cars "slipping and sliding," she says she
thought: "Those fools!"