campfire

Eh, I wouldn't say the cage murdered the Kia. The Kia was designed to softly crumple, and I really, really appreciate that. The situation would have been much worse had the kids been hit by the rigid-bumper cars I grew up with, or even by a modern tall truck (if it was tall enough to hit above the cage). The Kia survived and made a full recovery.

As for practicality, my kids are small enough to not always hold on. Cage gives them some protection from their own distractability. If they were bigger I would have gotten a normal seat instead of the cage.