The Hummer H2 model weighs 6,400 pounds; the base price is about $52,000.

09:13 AM EDT on Tuesday, June 15, 2004

BY TIMOTHY C. BARMANN
Journal Staff Writer

Larry Bonoff likes his toys big. Really big.

His 2002 banana-yellow Hummer weighs more than 3 tons and stands almost 7 feet tall.

It gets only about 11.5 miles to the gallon, but that doesn't seem to bother Bonoff, even with gasoline prices near an all-time high.

He's having too much fun to worry.

"It's like a kid's radio-controlled truck, except you're in it now," Bonoff said, as he sat behind the wheel of his Hummer, showing off features such as the six cigarette-lighter sockets.

It is a pain, though, that some gas stations shut off the pump at $50, even if he's not done filling. He's got to swipe the credit card again, Bonoff said, to fill up the rest of the 33-gallon tank.

Americans like big things, experts say, and that is one of factors behind today's high gasoline prices.

Over the past 28 years, drivers have become increasingly fond of light trucks, which include pickups, minivans and sport-utility vehicles. Those now account for about half of all light-vehicle sales, up from about 20 percent in 1976, according to data compiled by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Journal photo / Mary Murphy Jean and Larry Bonoff, of Warwick, at home with their cars: Jean's MINI Cooper, the tiny BMW-made car that gets 29 to 36 miles per gallon, and Larry's Hummer, which is made by General Motors and gets about 11.5 miles to the gallon.

Cars made up 80 percent of the market in 1976, and now account for the other half of light-vehicle sales today.

That shift away from cars, which are generally more fuel efficient, has helped push up gasoline consumption to its highest level ever.

Since 1991, the demand for gasoline has jumped 23.5 percent, to about 8.9 million barrels a day, according to the Energy Information Administration, part of the U.S. Department of Energy.

Analysts have said that demand is so high for gasoline that refineries are operating at or near capacity, causing prices to rise.

Bonoff, whose family ran the Warwick Musical Theatre until it closed in 1999, gets a lot of looks as he drives his Hummer around town. His license plate is "HUMMA."

"I really don't give a crap about what people think about what I drive, how I dress, what I do," Bonoff said on a recent spin around Warwick in the Hummer.

"This is America. One size doesn't fit all."

The Hummer certainly isn't for everyone. The H2 model weighs 6,400 pounds, stands 6 3/4 feet high, with roof rack. The base price is about $52,000.

The boxy-shaped vehicle, and its more expensive predecessor, the H1, are modeled after the U.S. military's High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle, or Humvee.

The original H1, which starts at about $106,000, has all the capabilities of the military version, such as the ability to drive through water several feet deep. The H2, at half the price, is more of a luxury car.

The typical buyer of the H2, which was launched in July 2002, is a male in his mid-40s with an annual household income of about $200,000, said Keith Donovan, a spokesman for Hummer, a division of General Motors, in Detroit. The H2 owners tend to have two or three other vehicles and often don't use the Hummer as their primary one, he said.

GM sells about 30,000 to 35,000 a year, Donovan said. Sales have begun to level off recently, although it's not clear whether that is related to recent high gas prices, he said.

The Hummer is so popular that their owners have formed clubs, including the New England Hummer Owners Group. It has several Rhode Island members, according to Manny MacMillan, who runs the Web site for the group (http://www.nehog.org).

Bonoff lives in a modest neighborhood of ranch houses that sit within the flight path of T.F. Green Airport.

One wall of his living room is lined with pictures showing him, or his late parents Buster and Barbara Bonoff, posing with famous entertainers who performed at the Warwick Musical Theatre.

Now that the theater is closed, Bonoff has his own business that lines up big acts for the Providence Performing Arts Center, he said.

When the weather is nice, he'll leave the Hummer at home and take out one of his two Harley-Davidson motorcycles.

He bought his Hummer in December 2002 for about $55,000 from the only dealer in the state.

The Hummer's huge size provides an additional level of security in case of an accident, he said.

"It protects me against people on a cell phone, people who have driven less than five years, drunk drivers, people who lost their license, people who have licenses but no insurance, and illegal aliens," he said.

"If they get in an accident with me and my Hummer, I'm probably gonna live."

What if the Hummer causes someone else to get hurt who otherwise would not have been in an accident?

"I don't care," he said. "My goal in life is to protect me."

People do all sorts of things to keep themselves safe, he said, such as buying alarm systems for their houses.

As for the poor gas mileage, Bonoff said he's not that concerned about it. Why should he be, he asks, when the government is not serious about trying to cut energy usage?

He cites as an example that wind or solar power hasn't gone very far over the past 40 years. There was also a recent article in USA Today about how the United States isn't doing enough to help oil rigs in Iraq pump more efficiently, he said.

"I'm not going to drive myself crazy for another 100 gallons a year."

And then there's the tax write-off.

Since he owns his own business, and his company car weighs more than 6,000 pounds, tax laws allow him to deduct 60 percent of the value of the vehicle.

That $39,000 write-off amounted to a $13,000 discount on his federal income tax, he said. "From an accountant's point of view, you have to be crazy not to do it."

There is some balance in the Bonoff household when it comes to gasoline consumption.

Bonoff's wife, Jean, drives a MINI Cooper, the tiny BMW-made car that gets 29 to 36 miles per gallon.

She said she's thrilled for her husband that he enjoys his Hummer, and she encouraged him to buy it.

But it's not a car she would have bought for herself.

"A Hummer does nothing for me," she said, in earshot of her husband.

"No offense, honey," she added.

"There is a frugal side to me," Jean Bonoff said in an interview later. "I wouldn't get a vehicle that gets only 10 or 12 miles to the gallon."

"That's just the way that I'm brought up. I've always worked for my money before I met Larry. I'm just not a wasteful person."