Cars here in the US look absurdly big in comparison.
First
- The US evolved as a country around the automotive and train industry, so cities were build with large open spaces and people became used to that
- European countries emerged way before that, so the people were already used to live in cities and work close to home. So people do not have the need to use the car that often
Second
- Europe has a larger density of population while being smaller than the US, so there is less space available, both for houses and for cars
- All european countries have strong welfare states with universal public healthcare system that cost a lot of money, and tax on gasoline is one of the largest provider for those services, reason why gasoline is expensive, which is an incentive for smaller fuel-efficient cars
Cars in the US don't look absurdly big. They are absurdly big. The car has been invented in Europe (Germany to be more precise) and has evolved with into what it is now, in keeping with what it needs to be. Only in the US they started building ridiculously big cars for no other reason than that they could. For us Europeans, everything in the US is unnecessary big. The cars, the buildings, the portions of meals, the shopping trolleys, the people themselves even. So the cars in Europe are indeed smaller than in the US, but that's only because they are too big in the US.
The average middle-income family from Northwestern Europe has 2 cars: a smaller city car and a larger sedan/estate/MPV/SUV type vehicle. Aside from the ubiquitous VW Golf, some of the most common cars on the road in my particular European country (Belgium) are the Audi A4 and BMW 3 series, those are mid-sized even by oversized American standards, not tiny compacts.
Here's a few videos showing a whole range of cars on our roads:
Driving in Limburg province, away from all the big cities: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcDypoVrPBI
Police driving through Brussels, Belgium's capital and largest city: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mr-lr0wyUQg
The small coastal city of Knokke-Heist, Belgium's most popular supercarspotting hot spot: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEG5ui904Z4
Not all tiny cars.
I think it's because streets are smaller in Europe, so it's difficult to find a car park.
Try to run a SUV in the inner cities of towns that have been build 1000 years before they have invented cars ;)
Most European cities were well established hundreds, even thousands, of years before cars were invented.
You seem to be an idiot!!
Europeans have smaller balls so they drive wimpy, gay looking vehicles.
