It looks cool as hell though!

Numbers that I'm seeing at Top Gear-which may be old, or inadequately labelled-list the mileage as 11 mpg lower (17%) and the car as 15% more expensive (though part of that must be included options) than the little 90-odd 1.6 diesel that Farah got stuck with. Which is amazing, considering the two 2.0 diesels make…

So, the small engined, super-high MPG cars that were being discussed the whole time (in the original article, in the comments), which Matt Farah was apparently driving, are indeed slow as molasses? Much, much slower than his Volt?

So, properly driving a modern diesel passenger car means "Don't try to do the things you could with a US spec engine"? Or you are implying that there is some magic method of driving a diesel he doesn't understand, other than 'Give up, you're in a slow car'.

0-60, 9.2 seconds. 5.7s 50-70 mph for the Volt. What diesel is that worse than? The most expensive, largest engined diesel Focus you can buy?

Just please, please let them correct the damn transmission. Everything awful ever said about the Smart FourTwo transmissions was proved correct the first time I ever tried one...and every time since (Car2Go is still a great service).

Adam, there is no way my comment will resonate kindly with you, and that is a shame, and not something I am proud of. I even enjoy Saab and respect several of the late manufacturer's cars.

Er-you must have missed my joke. I AM a P. Eng. Your friend had an arduous process due to his qualifications being from another country. The 'exam' that we Canadian-educated engineers have to pass is basically an ESL test.

That will only be amusing the first time I see it done, but the effect, as I scroll past entire other threads, is wonderful.

Intensive? Hmm. Alberta's is a 100-question multiple choice test.

It's a Professional Practice Exam, same as every province. No testing on technical compentency if you have an engineering degree from an accredited school.

It's far more straightforward to become professional engineer in Canada (if you go to a Canadian engineering school). They are all accreditted, so you don't have further compentency exams. Then it's just the four year work record and promising that you're trying to keep learning.

If you can possibly swallow the purchase price, the very low depreciation will cover some fuel costs.

Gas tank is in the wrong spot. Look at the spare tire on the Civic. Excellent guess though. Maybe one of those goofy Nissan AWD wagons from the early 90s?

Surely that would cause the train wheels to get sticky?

Couldn't tell you :-) But why would you ever get rid of it?

No, still had the leg burners, but they did get AC that year.

TVs/Screens in the trunk. Don't get me wrong, I don't thing it's necessarily a wrong thing to do, but by filling your trunk with a TV and speakers, you are saying "I will destroy the utility of my vehicle in order to impressive people with my car while it is sitting still in a parking lot", and it doesn't really get…

And massive roadworks projects make those luxuries far more affordable...for a time. In the long run, it's much easier to scale up and much more efficient to pack people in like sardines; it's a balance of the two that has to be sought for big cities. You don't want all the wealthy people to move out of the city, so…

Maybe increased congestion will encourage people to live in greater density in order to reduce or eliminate their need to drive daily?