Can a car and its owner be soulmates? I don’t mean that in the way some people name their cars. I mean it like the reader who called to tell me how much he loves his Toyota Avalon. This fellow’s love affair with his Avalon…
After my recent column exploring vehicle safety inspections, many readers “voiced” opinions on the topic via email. The tally of those comments revealed 70% of the responders saying “no” to mandatory checks, 20% thinking “maybe” and only 10% in favor of them. In support of…
To grasp the impact of crossovers on sedan sales, we need look no further than Ford. As it has for years, Ford’s full-size F-150 pickup easily tops brand sales. It’s been the country’s, best-selling vehicle for 36 years. But the No. 2 vehicle in Ford’s…
Other than individual reform, there is no way to substantially end driver distraction caused by behavior like roadside rubbernecking, fiddling with vehicle controls, or daydreaming. We’ve been doing those things for years, along with disciplining children, grooming, changing CDs, et cetera. Drivers may have even…
If you’d asked me last month to describe the typical Mazda CX-3 driver, school teachers would have made the cut. Grandmothers probably not. The CX-3 is Mazda’s subcompact crossover. It’s small, sporty and exuberantly designed. Its $20,000 price tag targets first-time buyers — young professionals…
A whiff of inevitability attends today’s column. There is for starters the inevitability — or at least the ubiquity — of its subject. In 1995, Honda’s CR-V pioneered the compact crossover segment and, since, nearly four million copies have been sold in the US alone.…
Where do you stand on mandatory, periodic safety inspections for vehicles registered to operate on public roadways? It’s yet another level of government involvement and increased regulation, but given the operating condition of certain automobiles, inspections might have merit. As for one concerned driver, reader...
For weeks, the winding, downhill dirt road between our house and the highway was an ice sheet. It was treacherous enough that leaving home invoked a three-step ritual: 1) engage the lowest gear available in whatever rig we were driving; 2) take a deep breath;…
Automobiles were barely invented when the death toll resulting from vehicle crashes was tallied for 1899. 26 individuals lost their life that year in a trend that would move markedly upward. For each successive year, U.S. fatalities increased to the point where nearly 100 motorists…
Periodically, the topic of left-lane louts arises. Those are drivers who perpetually occupy the left lane of multi-lane roadways without due cause. This time it came up when a young driver told me that he has a right to drive in that lane if he...
Consider the Dodge Durango, a rear-wheel outlier in a world of front-wheel crossovers. Like the Jeep Grand Cherokee, whose platform it shares, the Durango uses a crossover-style unibody rather than a truck’s heavier body-on-frame platform. Both rigs shun the crossover’s front-wheel-drive convention, employing rear-wheel-drive instead.…
Driver use of dashcams (dashboard cameras) is rising worldwide, including popularity gains in the United States. They were first widely employed in Russia as a defense against police corruption and insurance fraud. Mounted via suction cup, adhesive or Velcro to the dashboard or windshield, they…
Bad weather in the mountains forced a schedule change, bringing us a Mazda CX-9 for review and not the Genesis G90 we’d expected. The Seattle vendor that delivers our test vehicles thought better of driving a 420-horsepower, rear-wheel-drive luxury sedan over snow-hammered Snoqualmie Pass. It…
Yesterday, I conducted an informal survey, noting the vehicles that were passing through my residential neighborhood for about 20 minutes. The traffic consisted of fathers, mothers and others who were picking up picking up kids from school. Maybe the survey results are skewed with this…
Reversing years of resistance, Americans are finally buying into hatchbacks. They have good reason. Hatchbacks offer more utility than the sedans they’re based on, and they’re more economical to own and operate than crossovers. Hatchbacks account for a small fraction of US sales, but their...
Last year, I wrote about a recent EV (electric vehicle) development resurgence. After the first wave of marginally successful EV marketing, Google, Apple, General Motors, Volkswagen, Ford, Mercedes-Benz, Renault, Nissan, Toyota, Tesla and others are at it again. Limited range, high cost and difficulty finding…
I first experienced Acura’s Super Handling All-Wheel-Drive (SH-AWD) system piloting an MDX across Snoqualmie Pass in a blinding snowstorm. The torque-vectoring system transformed a white-knuckle drive into a revelation. As snow deepened and other drivers slowed, I fought the urge to speed up. The faster…
Who can argue with the crossover’s growing popularity? Crossovers are roomy, utilitarian and, with the easy availability of all-wheel-drive, enormously practical in snowy climes. In our rush to crossovers, though, let’s not forget the humble four-door sedan. Sedans are more affordable than crossovers, they’re more...
I’ve written columns devoted to driver distraction many times over the course of a decade or so. And writing about it can evidently only raise awareness, since it has remained rampant despite reporting by me and countless others. While drivers have always been distracted by…
I pondered erratic driver behavior during a recent drive on a two-lane Washington highway. It could have been in any state or on any highway, since certain ill-advised, unexplained driver actions seem to surface everywhere. The crazy act I endured for over ten miles was…
Should your crossover shopping lead you to the 2017 Kia Sorento, I’d advise taking along a spreadsheet. The midsize Sorento is available in a dizzying array of configurations. The $20,000 spread that separates the base L trim ($26,295) and the topmost SX Limited ($46,595) merely...
Like an emissary from the Land of the Midnight Sun, Volvo’s new S90 sedan stopped by for our first real taste of winter. Of course, Volvo knows winter. The rigors of Swedish winters gave rise to its focus on stout construction and safety innovation. Volvo’s…
I received much communication in response to my column making a plea for additional lanes on US Highway 195. One of those emails came from M.D. who drives 195 every day. But instead of the section south of Spangle, he drives the northerly four-lane stretch…
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