I wish the rebate money were being spent on the R&D needed to actually make EVs cheaper and viable.

I’ll be your huckleberry. Fuck these guys and anyone who admires them.

Hasn’t there been huge push back and rescinding of red light cameras? How would this be any different?

The M96 engine is probably worth $10-15K by itself. 

I think you’re picking the Atlas because you’re a VWAG guy. Which is fine, but is obviously not an objective assessment or endorsement of the Atlas. You predetermined the Atlas was your pick of the class, and found reasons to support that conclusion, rather than the other way around. Outside of infotainment and…

Doubling the physical density of batteries doesn’t do anything to address EV’s biggest impediment to market adoption- price. Who gives a shit if the battery is more dense when said batteries still add a five figure cost to an economy car?

95% of trips fall well within EV range, and if it doesn’t, then rent a ICE powered car for a day or 2.

If the Tiguan made decent power it would be a nice option. As is all of VW’s crossovers are a bit underpowered. The top dog Atlas is as much as 1.5s slower to 60 than its competition with similar HP/size/fuel economy. When you’re loaded up with family and luggage I’m sure that gulf grows.

I guess this depends on what makes a car fun to you. If it’s just performance a CX-5 Turbo or Sportage SX should fit the bill. But there is only so much stuff a manufacturer can do at this price point.

I’m not convinced. Economies of scale require market interest, which just isn’t there for EVs, at least at the price points that generate profits. And while I agree that manufacturers should share more common components- not just for EV stuff, but ICE components too- it also puts manufacturers at a competitive…

We have to separate actual prices from consumer choices. Take the Honda Civic for example. For the last 20 years its inflation adjusted price has basically been flat:

I think this is good news. We don’t need AMG G-Wagens and GLBs. A happy compromise would be to make all remaining AMG cars PHEVs with Atkinson cycle naturally aspirated V8s (with DoD of course). But what’s more likely is the horrific rumor that they will become hybrids, but also lose 4 cylinders.

I am the OP and I never said that. Don’t do that. A midgrade compact car doesn’t have 15 year old S-Class tech and should run for 250K miles- which by the way is probably 2-3x more miles than the average person keeps a car for and is kind of a pointless metric to judge cars by.

I don’t know if this is supposed to be satire, but either way it’s bad. There are plenty of people who don’t want or need fully loaded cars, and there are plenty of options available for them. Everything doesn’t have to turn into some conspiracy where we dump on and broadbrush a group of people or industry.

Most young people need and have cars; the notion that “all” future customers are learning to live without cars is a gross, hyperbolic exaggeration.

a) Yes but the implication that prices are going up because of some conspiracy to take away affordable choices is bunk

This is luddite talk. People literally said the same about much of the tech in your Town Car when said tech was new.

No collector’s car is objectively “worth it”, maybe outside of a McLaren F1. I don’t think you understand how this works. Pretty much all of those cars are collectible status IMO.

Cars are not getting more expensive; if anything we’ve never been able to get more car for the money. Compare a current Civic to an old Accord (or hell even an older Acura). Through various forces and factors (shift to crossovers, low interest rates, continually strong economy for some, more and more leasing) people…

Isn’t the whole point of these things to eventually replace gas cars? How do impractical rich people play things get us there?