That's not inexplicably bald Freddy Prinz Jr?

What kind of question is that? If lots of people choose to buy a Civic rather than a Corolla, why exactly does it merit asking if lots of people will buy a Civic Hybrid rather than a Corolla Hybrid? Like, absolute most basic answer - the Civic has 99cu ft interior space, while the Corolla only has 89 and the Prius has…

I want this to be good, but both the CGI and physics in the crash at 2:00 or so looks like a cutscene from a 20yo video game.

It’s not a lot, but it’s just about the only thing most people remember about the movie (also the Porsche, which I believe has lead to some discomfort at at least one Porsche-affiliated event when someone thought Risky Business was an appropriate movie to show).

Respectfully, as I know you’ve done the business travel thing for years, but how’s your recollection on the mileage on a rental car you would’ve driven a decade ago? I’ve absolutely driven a few cars that couldn’t hit the low bar the EPA sets in the real world, but between Fuelly and period road tests, there seems to…

Haven’t had time to dig into the study, but I suspect it requires being taken with a grain of salt (or it’s very UK specific). For what it’s worth, a 2013 Camry weighs about the same as a 2023 RAV4 (LE to LE AWD), fuel economy is same in the city and RAV is 1mpg worse highway, EPA also estimates it emits a whopping 3…

If you’re going PT, at least use a late period one when they were basically all Cerberus-era rental fleet filler that had the initial charm stripped out of them, were pretty much all base models, and had almost no fun colours.

I’m not sure “let’s take an F360 Modena but make it edgier than a teenaged boy” is how you make a great looking car, but at least the engineers work harder than the stylists.

When chain-link fence is your design inspiration

Faux NACA duct! It actually has its origins in aviation (via a government funded lab), but usually a good sign of good car.

There’s not been a ton of variation to Ontario’s plates - for 50 years, it was some variation of a white plate with blue lettering (and starting in the 90's, the option of some pretty benign logos stamped on, like if you supported the Leafs or Ontario Provincial Parks or something). But in 2020, we got an entirely new…

I’d be more forgiving of no BRG if they were a little closer to Ecurie Ecosse blue.

Small side effect as well, Toyota (via Denso) gave us the QR code, which was developed for parts inventory control. 

In 1914, a Model T Touring car sold for $490, or about 38% of the $1300 someone would take home at $5/day, so not far off the $40k against a $100k salary today.

It’s not my theory to claim (I got it from Paul Ingrassia, in his book Engines of Change), but an argument can be made that the Chevrolet Corvair got George W Bush elected - that through attempting to destroy Nader’s reputation rather than letting any controversy from Unsafe At Any Speed blow over, they inadvertently…

As far as names borrowed from the periodic table of elements, it’s better than Cobalt.

Eh, at a minimum, we could be benchmarking other cities with better infrastructure and similar geography/population/layout. Like, it's pretty much always Amsterdam that comes up, and even they only have a roughly 30% cycling modal share. I figure it's reasonable to say my more populous, sprawling city will not reach…

Baking Bad

Pic, because Kinja’d

I don’t know if it’s a common thing, but I’ve seen it more than once - making a Honda look like a BMW. I mean, don’t get me wrong, in their pre-Bangle days, they were clean, reasonably timeless cars, and there’s a few Bangle-era things that work, but the styling is never the biggest selling point of the thing. Plus,…