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It's useful for emergencies, but it'll kill a starter motor pretty shortly. Without the weight of the vehicle, you don't want to crank a car starter for more than 15 or 20 seconds. Using it to move around a vehicle would significantly shorten it's life.
Diesel 18 wheelers have REALLY heavy duty starters - sometimes they're a real pig to start. It's pretty common to move them in and out of the shop when they are gelled up on the stater motor alone. They have some SERIOUS gear reduction in the transmission in the lowest gears ... so they don't really do anything other than drain the batteries.
My father had the clutch break on his truck during a rush hour traffic jam on the long island expressway. It wouldn't disengage. He would shut it off in 1st gear when traffic wasn't moving - then when traffic would start moving, he would start the truck in 1st gear then shift along without the clutch and just kill it in gear when he had to stop (brakes still worked).
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