Trying to create a trailing dust effect behind a vehicle on a dirt road
For example
Is this possible using Niagara or is there another approach?
Sure you can. You can add as a component in your vehicle blueprint, choose de Transform and make sure that you start it deactivated. Then in your blueprint you can script so that you know when to activate it.
You can even set the physical material on the materials. So that when your vehicle wants to activate the trail, first it will get the physical material you are dealing with (Dust or water for example) and then setting wich effect you should activate.