The Bright Lights are Always on High
DO you think perhaps the wrong people are being bailed out? Do you think?
In the midst of the multi-billion dollar taxpayer-funded rescue packages for Detroit, the Ford Motor company has unveiled its new "self-parking" car.
The CEO of Ford makes the personal admission that he found parallel parking the most stressful part of his driver's test.
The new technology will be available on some Lincoln's and new seven-passenger Lincoln MKT luxury crossover vehicle.
Is it called a crossover vehicle because it can cross over to the other side of town? Because it is trans(mission)-gendered? Or because it's really more a battleship or Panzer tank than car?
5 comments:
the government should give the bail out money to the customers who are more likely to pay it back.
How about interest free loans for North American built cars only, with the proviso that any trade-in over eight years old has to be taken off the road and scrapped. The government would pay an attractive trade-in amount for the old car.
This way North American manufacturers would sell their cars, and the nation's fleet would become newer with lower emissions.
In 1999, I was driving a Nissan Sentra (it was a leaky, old piece of junk - but it was paid for).
I was driving, even though I learned, after a few months of car ownership, that I HATE DRIVING. My passenger was a long time male friend.
We were in Deep Cove and there was nary a parking spot to be found. I had been driving around and around when I saw a little spot between two other parked cars. My upper lip started to sweat and I said aloud, "I'll try to park there."
My friend rolled his eyes and advised that "even (he) would not be able to parallel park in this spot."
It was then that I learned that there is a God that controls all things. Obviously the almighty must have invisibly reached down, grasped hold of my junker car and deftly placed me in said parking spot with an adequate few inches both front and back.
My friend couldn't believe his eyes. I couldn't believe that I managed that park with such quick precision.
How's that for a "self parking" feature! LOL!!!!!
PS - I still hate driving, I sold my junker years ago. My dear husband drives and I walk or take transit the rest of the time. My male friend has still never seen such a good parking job in his life.
As for the bailout package - My husband and I bought a Honda minivan. The domestic products didn't even make it to our list of possibilities. We have backup sensors on the van. Hubby says that the combination of due diligence and the sensors makes parking quite easy.
There are plenty of other features to spend money developing.
Linda Yuill
I sat with one of the owners of Wyndell lumber for breakfast Monday morning talking about this. While Wyndell is going strong (more custom product) most of the lumber industry is…well we all know don’t we? It is not doing so well. And we are too afraid to bail out the lumber industry because of USA perception-concerns and fear of auto-workers pig-headed unions.
Why are we bailing out an industry that has very little future? Why don’t we let the small innovative(local) companies have a fair chance with their electric cars (http://www.itiselectric.com/), and Algea Diesel (http://www.sunxenergy.com/)?
Why are we supporting a dinosaur competitor of the future whom currently only masters mediocrity?
Why do we expect the soon to be unemployed people of country to have savings to “get by on” and we don’t expect the car companies to save in their profitable years; we just bail them out over and over.
Instead, let us invest in the future, and move the current car companies to Drumheller where they belong.
That's a shame about Ford, personally I regard them as the most likely to survive out of the Detroit 3. They actually do make some cars worth buying, and own companies like Mazda and Volvo of whom I've long been a fan.
Self parking cars worry me, if the person driving is unable to parallel park they probably should not be on the road. However, I am impressed that the system Ford has come up with is superior to the one by Lexus(Toyota) in that it allows parallel parking on an incline.
Here's hoping Ford gets its head screwed on right and survives to bring over its excellent Fiesta. Humourous video review of it here.
Didnt ford decline the bailout for now?
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