[Wavery]

Bill,

We are seeing what has been inevitable for a long time. The truck based SUVs have been classified as trucks (which is what they are). Classifying them as trucks has gotten the manufacturers around a lot of regulations that are placed on passenger vehicles (which is what they should be). *****(this is an edit....I read my post and realized that I wrote it bass-ackwards).

As all vehicles have to pass stricter fuel economy standards, manufacturers have to make adjustments in their product line to meet these standards. They are now forced to build the SUVs as passenger vehicles, make them lighter to comply with new fuel economy and safety regulations. I think that we may see all truck based SUVs disappear over the next few years. After-all, an SUV is primarily a passenger vehicle and really not a truck and should be subject to all of the regulations of a passenger vehicle.

I think that you will see a more clear delineation between trucks and passenger vehicles and trucks may be heavily penalized for their lack of fuel efficiency, thus making trucks a smaller percentage of the fleet and making government compliance possible.

Very close are the days of $5 a gallon gasoline. That coupled with the pressure to downsize manufacturers fleets will put a lot of pressure on the RV manufacturers. As you rightly point out, the RVing lifestyle seems to be in jeopardy and none of us know (or like) where this may be headed.