Trucks Are Not Just Too Big Now, They're Also Too Tall

Photo: Mazda

Trucks were once easy to load with cargo thanks to lower bed heights. Truck beds used to be so low, in fact, that you could just skip on up, or easily slide lumber and other cargo onto their flat surfaces, then skip back down without need for a fancy tailgate. It was glorious.

Ram Recalls 1.4 Million Pickup Trucks for Tailgates That Can Fly Open While Driving

This affects full-sizers, but midsize pickup trucks have been particularly affected in recent years. Trucks like the Ford Ranger and its Mazda B-Series sibling, the Nissan Frontier, Toyota Pickup and Chevrolet S-10 once offered absurdly easy loading and unloading. Lately, these trucks have strayed from their roots as utility vehicles. I guess I just want to know what happened to all the truck shorties. What happened to all those trucks that made loading bikes a breeze?

Photo: Nissan

Now that trucks are all latent off-roaders, or are otherwise posturing to look the part, truck beds are unnecessarily taller than they used to be. While carmakers don’t often list flatbed heights in official specs, overall truck height and ground clearance can give us an idea of how taller beds are now, and of how much more effort it could take to load and unload cargo.

1993 Ford Ranger – Height: 64.3 inches; Ground Clearance: 6.7 inches.2023 Ford Ranger – Height: 70.7 – 73.2 inches (Ranger Tremor); Ground Clearance: 8.4 – 9.7 inches (Ranger Tremor).1993 Toyota Pickup (Truck) – Height: 60.8 – 61.4 inches; Ground Clearance: 6.7 – 7.5 inches.2023 Toyota Tacoma – Height: 70.6 – 71.6 inches (Tacoma TRD Pro); Ground Clearance: 9.4 inches.1993 Nissan Frontier – Height: 62 – 67.1 inches. Ground Clearance: 6.7 – 7.1 inches.2023 Nissan Frontier – Height: 71.6 – 72.9 inches (Frontier Pro-4X); Ground Clearance: 9.0 – 9.8 inches (Frontier Pro-4X).

In the most extreme cases, some of these trucks have gotten 10 inches taller, and ground clearance at the rear has increased by up to three inches. That may not sound like much, but it makes a difference when repeatedly loading and unloading cargo, day in and day out. As in the case of working class trucks.

These changes come at the expense of the trucks’ usability. I’m all for ground clearance on trucks that are actually going to go off-road, but more ground clearance and taller heights are not ideal for trucks that’ll be regularly used to ferry cargo on public roads. I’d argue taller stances are less suited for road-going vehicles in general, given how height can impact comfort on the highway. I just miss the days of reasonably accessible truck beds, I guess. The heydays of the glorious Chevy S-10 or the shorty Mazda B-Series and Toyota Pickups.