'14 Chevy Sonic hatchback squares off with Fiesta

Those four exposed, round, motorcycle-type headlights are brightening the drive for the 2014 Chevrolet Sonic.

The Chevy subcompact has been well received since arriving on the scene for the 2012 model year, replacing the Aveo. Only the Nissan Versa is outselling the Sonic among the subcompacts this year.

The Ford Fiesta, another small car I’ve driven recently, is much sleeker in style. The Sonic, though, with its lights, hood strakes, a rear spoiler atop the hatch and nice black wheels, has added appeal.

Other than some slipping and sliding at three or four intersections, the Sonic hatchback got around in its front-wheel-drive configuration with little difficulty in last week’s 4-inch snowfall.

The Sonic and Fiesta are direct competitors and sized closely; the Sonic is an inch longer in wheelbase, while the Fiesta is that much longer in overall length.

Sonic performed a bit better with its 1.4-liter, Ecotec turbocharged 4-cylinder and 6-speed manual transmission against Ford’s 1.6-liter and 5-speed manual. Ford offers an ST version with turbo that would compete more closely with the Sonic.

The Chevy’s turboed 4 is the same horsepower, 138, as the Sonic’s base 1.8-liter; the turbo boost comes on with added torque, 148 to 125 for the base model. The Sonic LT is stronger in low-end acceleration.

The Sonic, designed in South Korea, is bullt in Michigan.

Its hatchback style offers cargo capabilities; its space behind the rear seats is only 19 cubic feet, but drop the seatbacks flat and that expands to 47.7 feet. I made use of some of that in carrying fencing and posts across town. It is easy loading and unloading.

With Jan and Brent Wells, I drove the Sonic to the Church Ranch Event Center in Westminster on Sunday afternoon for a memorial service for Tim Chmelka, 54, who passed away Nov. 16. He and my son Dale were close friends since they were 4th graders back in the late 1960s.

Even with that 100-mile highway sprint, the Sonic’s overall fuel average for the week was 33.1 miles per gallon. It probably should do some better, with an EPA estimate of 29/40. The Fiesta, in similar type driving, averaged 35.7.

The Sonic hatchback is a roomy four-door, though fairly tight in rear-seat legroom and footroom. Its rear door handles are positioned high up in the C pillar area.

An interior highlight is a large display screen with rearview camera. Other equipment included 10 airbags and lane-departure warning system. The right-side dash accommodates two glove compartments, the upper one containing a USB port, and two added cubby holes are on either side of the climate/audio center stack area.

The Sonic’s sticker price of $20,405 also included driver information center, cruise control, rear-window wiper/washer/defroster, AM/FM/CD audio with Bluetooth and XM satellite radio, air conditioning and Hankook Optimo P205/55R16 tires.

The Fiesta hatchback, with fewer options than the Sonic, came it at a considerably lower price $17,135. Its only add-ons were heated front seats and dual power heated side mirrors. The Fiesta also uses Hankook tires, smaller than the Sonic’s, at 185/60R15.

The Fiesta’s exterior design is very sleek, with long headlights and protruding grille out front. Its well-bolstered driver’s seat is small, fairly comfortable. Among the Fiesta’s standard items list are capless fuel filler, tilt/telescope steering wheel, air conditioning, and message center. The Fiesta is equipped with front disc/rear drum brakes, same as the Sonic.

Both the Sonic and Fiesta are available in four-door sedans, as well as the hatchbacks.

Two new sedan options added to the Sonic are the performance-inspired RS and the restyled Dusk.

A sporty front fascia, sport-tuned suspension, aluminum sport pedals and three-spoke, leather-wrapped steering wheel with contrasting stitching add flair to the RS. The Dusk is finished in ashen gray metallic paint, with a ground effects package and 18-inch wheels.

Notes from e-mail

Concerning the reader letter on the Honda Pilot, Bud, I think he was being charitable in saying, “It hasn’t kept up with competitors in its exterior style.” Beauty is truly in the eye of the beholder, but to me all of its iterations have been rather ugly. I was puzzled by the SUVs you listed as sales competition for the Pilot. I thought at least a few of those were body-on-frame 4x4s, unlike the Pilot which is a tall Accord-based 4×4 vehicle. I believe the Highlander would be a much more valid car to compare with the Pilot. – MTM

Of the five SUVs I listed as competitors of the Pilot, all are unibody 4x4s except for the Toyota 4Runner, which is body-on-frame. These days, Michael, I believe the four-wheel-drive systems are about as important to offroad capability as is the frame structure, i.e. the Jeep Grand Cherokee. Most body-on-frame units have given way to unibody construction.

See BMW's exclusive X6 M Design Edition

The luxury car company plans to build just 100 examples of a special Design Edition version of the BMW X6 M sports crossover.

The emphasis of this limited edition SUV is on two things: sportiness, but above all, exclusivity. Only 100 customers will be chosen to take delivery of a BMW X6 M Design Edition.

The limited edition model comes with a serious interior upgrade, the seats and instrument panel finished in Merino leather while the dashboard fascia features a piano black veneer.

Owners will also be able to look at an edition-specific badge prominently mounted on the instrument panel to know which one of the 100 examples they are driving.

Outside, the car sits on 21-inch M Performance light-alloy wheels in a double-spoke design with carbon elements while there is a choice of three exterior paint finishes: Alpine White, Sapphire Black or Melbourne Red metallic.

The car also gets carbon-fiber front chin and rear spoilers, but the 4.4-liter turbocharged 547bhp V8 that powers the ‘stock’ edition will be carried over, untouched for this limited edition model.

And any potential customer put off by the M performance racing stripes need not worry, they are optional.

BMW is yet to announce pricing.

Tesla faces uphill fight against dealers, lawmakers

WASHINGTON — Tesla Motors was in trouble in North Carolina. Prohibited from opening showrooms there, it was on the way to being unable to sell cars at all when the state Senate voted unanimously to block online auto sales.

Then Tesla turned out a lobbying weapon that, in the home state of stock-car racing’s hall of fame, spoke louder than money: It parked a Model S at the Capitol and invited lawmakers and Gov. Pat McCrory, R, to take it for a spin.

“When you accelerate it, it was the same sort of feeling I got when I test-drove a Mustang Boss back when I was probably 23 years old,” Republican House Speaker Thomas Tillis, 53, told the Raleigh News & Observer.

So ended the anti-Tesla legislation. Tillis’s chamber never voted on it.

Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk’s strategy of selling his $70,000-and-up electric car directly to customers through the Internet or company galleries has pitted him in at least seven states against franchised dealers who view Tesla’s marketing and sales models as threats to their existence.

Tesla delivered about 5,500 Model S in the third quarter, more than twice as many as it did in all of last year. It said Nov. 6 it plans to deliver “slightly under 6,000”³ this quarter with Musk saying demand exceeds supply. Its sales depend on access to customers, which it reaches through showrooms modeled on those of tech companies.

The fight with dealers isn’t the company’s sole challenge. Tesla also faces a threat in Washington, where its Model S is under U.S. investigation following three battery fires, and three workers were injured Nov. 13 at its only assembly plant in an industrial accident.

At both the state and federal level, the Palo Alto, Calif.-based company is running a risk Microsoft faced in the 1990s, when it found itself in the midst of a government antitrust action without an experienced advocacy team to shepherd it through the system and build allies for the future.

Musk is putting his star power against one of the best connected and most experienced U.S. lobbies, which has outspent Tesla by multitudes in state capitols and often has some of their own serving as legislators.

Dealers spent $86.8 million on state election races across the U.S. between 2003, when Musk created Tesla, and last year, according to the National Institute on Money in State Politics, a nonprofit in Helena, Mont. They’ve also pumped $53.7 million into federal campaigns, the Center for Responsive Politics found.

Tesla’s investment in state and federal politics was less than $500,000, those same sources show.

“The challenge we face, of course, is that the auto dealers are very strong and very influential at the state level, among the legislatures,” Musk told shareholders in June. Dealers, he said, are “making it harder to get things done.”

James Chen, Tesla’s vice president for regulatory affairs, didn’t respond to a phone call and e-mail seeking comment for this story. Diarmuid O’Connell, vice president for business development, didn’t provide comment when reached by e-mail. Liz Jarvis-Shean, a spokeswoman, didn’t respond to an e-mail seeking comment.

New York’s Assembly this year scrapped a bill that would’ve stopped Tesla sales in that state. Virginia granted Tesla one showroom license after initially turning it down amid threats from auto dealers to sue.

The showmanship that worked in North Carolina failed in Texas, where dealers spent nine times more than the company on 2012 elections and lobbying. Employees at Tesla’s Texas galleries can’t sell cars, offer test drives or discuss prices after legislation to repeal those restrictions failed to come to votes this year.

“The only people who are opposed to Tesla are the dealers,” said Massachusetts state Rep. David Linsky, D, whose district includes the company’s only gallery in the state. “Every legislator has auto dealers in their district, and they’re out in force.”

Tesla’s strategy hinges on its sales model, said Colin Rusch, a senior analyst with Northland Capital Markets.

“They have direct control over their brand and their consumer relationships,” said Rusch, who’s based in New York and rates Tesla shares “buy.” “They’re able to put their products in the best light and there aren’t competing interests.”

Dealers counter their model is better for consumers, by giving them a consistent place to go for service, and for automakers, by taking sales costs off their balance sheets.

“With factory-owned stores, if the factory goes out of business, so does the store,” said Tim Jackson, chief executive officer of the Colorado Auto Dealers Association, citing the examples of General Motors Co. brands that ended when the company was restructured in bankruptcy.

“If and when Tesla falls on hard times and shuts down, all of the service centers shut down at the same time because they are all factory-owned,” he said.

Jackson, who once got his picture with Musk at a Boulder, Colo., reception, credited the 42-year-old with having a “degree of star-quality” to what he calls the dog-and-pony show he puts on for legislators.

Tesla brought that show to the National Conference of State Legislatures annual summit in August in Atlanta. It made a Model S available for test drives and sponsored a panel with legislators from states including Colorado, Texas and Virginia.

In North Carolina, the anti-Tesla bill was sponsored by state Sen. Thomas Apodaca, R, one of three lawmakers to receive the North Carolina Automobile Dealers Association top gift of $8,000 in 2012. That year, the group spent $152,000 in campaign contributions, mostly to Republicans who control both chambers of the legislature, campaign records show.

On March 14, Apodaca filed legislation to block all automakers from selling cars over the Internet. The bill sailed through committee hearings and hit the Senate floor May 13, where it passed unanimously.

Within a week, Tesla added three North Carolina lobbyists, including former Raleigh Mayor Tom Fetzer, the state Republican chairman in 2010 when the party for the first time in 100 years won control of both chambers of the state house.

The company loaned a car to Leilani Munter, a self- described “vegetarian hippie chick” who races cars on developmental circuits for the Nascar and IndyCar leagues.

She wrote a Huffington Post essay May 23 calling the state’s legislation an encroachment “on the fundamental right of every American to choose what they want to drive,” and talked up Tesla to lawmakers during a capitol visit.

The Model S, recipient of this year’s highest performance ratings from Consumer Reports and top crash-test scores from U.S. regulators, then took the starring role.

Tillis, another recipient of an $8,000 check from the dealers, gave the Model S a solid review, as did Rep. Tim Moore, R, who described himself in an interview as “a car guy.”

“There were people here who didn’t even know there was such a vehicle as this,” Moore said.

His colleagues didn’t act on the Senate bill because “we just realized we needed to have more of a conversation about what was best for consumers,” he said.

In Texas, Musk flew in to testify for the pro-Tesla bill. As in North Carolina, the company brought in a Model S for legislators to drive, and included the state in a Tesla- sponsored electric charging network that skips most of the middle of the U.S.

State Rep. Eddie Rodriguez, D, who was impressed after driving a Tesla Roadster a couple years ago, sponsored the bill to let Tesla to sell in Texas.

“It was a risky proposition,” he said in a phone interview. “The auto dealers are a pretty powerful lobby here. I generally support dealers and they generally support me. I think it’s a really great product and I want to give them a shot with the economic model they have in place.”

Rodriguez said he plans to introduce a compromise in the legislature’s next session that would allow Tesla to sell directly to consumers until it reaches 5,000 annual sales in Texas. After that, it would have to adopt a dealership model.

In Washington, where seven members of Congress are auto dealers, Tesla has spent almost nothing on federal lobbying in the past two years while the National Automobile Dealers Association has an annual lobbying budget of about $3 million, disclosure reports show.

Tesla’s presence on Washington’s K Street is a showroom, not a lobbying shop. The company has one registered lobbyist, Daniel Witt, a former aide to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.

The company is trying to avoid a U.S. recall as the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration investigates two battery fires that started after Model S cars ran over road debris. A third fire occurred in Mexico, beyond the government’s oversight jurisdiction.

“For a situation like this, they really need to be staffed up in Washington,” said Howard Marlowe, a lobbyist for 35 years and past president of the American League of Lobbyists.

“They need to be protecting their interests with the safety board, and with investors, by showing they’re doing everything they can in Washington to maintain goodwill with key people in Congress,” he said.

What Tesla lacks in lobbyists it makes up for in star power, said Bill Allison, director of the Sunlight Foundation, a nonprofit money tracker in Washington.

Musk is “one of the few green success stories because he actually has a marketable product,” Allison said. “That kind of goodwill with an administration interested in environmental energy is more important than any other kind of lobbying.”

With Genesis line, Hyundai revamps its brand

NAMYANGJU, South Korea — Hyundai has revamped the luxury Genesis sedan for the first time since 2008, attempting to elevate its brand and grab a bigger share of U.S. car sales as competition from American and European automakers erodes Hyundai’s dominance in its South Korean stronghold.

Since entering the U.S. in 1986, Hyundai Motor Co. has carved out a niche with buyers looking for cheaper alternatives to Toyota’s big-selling Camry and Corolla marques. Sophistication, power and style have not been qualities typically associated with its brand. Now, South Korea’s largest automaker hopes to expand sales by competing more boldly with BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Toyota’s Lexus and other high-end models.

The new Genesis, unveiled Tuesday, will be available in the U.S. early next year and will be the first Hyundai luxury sedan sold in Europe. Y.J. Ahn, a director of Hyundai’s American business, said the redesigned sedan will help drive 10 percent growth in Hyundai’s U.S. sales next year from 734,000 vehicles expected this year. The automaker’s U.S. market share declined to 4.7 percent in the first nine months of this year from 4.9 percent in 2012.

“This is a chance to raise Hyundai’s image in the premium car market,” said Ahn.

The South Korean automaker, which with affiliate Kia Motors Corp. forms the world’s fifth-biggest car manufacturer, is in need of a boost.

South Korea’s free trade agreements with the U.S. and European Union have opened Hyundai’s home market to greater competition. Last year, almost one in every two vehicles sold in South Korea was made by Hyundai. Last month, Hyundai’s share had dropped to 42 percent.

Japan’s policy, meanwhile, of weakening the yen has given Japanese automakers a competitive edge in international sales. And a series of Hyundai recalls in North America and Asia have hurt the automaker’s image. Hyundai’s U.S. car sales rose 1.6 percent in the first nine months of this year compared with overall growth in auto sales of 8.1 percent.

The new Genesis models will be sold at between 46.6 million won ($43,908) and 69.6 million won ($65,582) in South Korea. Prices for the U.S. have yet to be announced, but the new models will be cheaper than cars from BMW or Mercedes-Benz, Hyundai officials said.

Eventually, Hyundai thinks car buyers will not balk at paying a premium for the Hyundai name.

“Hyundai cars are known for good value for money. But such perception can no longer make us competitive,” said Park Joon Hong, a research fellow at Hyundai’s R&D division.

Hyundai, the maker of the Elantra compact and Tucson crossover, was the world’s 43rd most valuable brand this year, according to Interbrand, a consultancy. But it is far behind the carmakers that Hyundai is trying to compete with in the luxury market. Toyota, Mercedes-Benz and BMW are in the top 12.

Park said quality control has become more rigid in response to recent recalls.

In the U.S., nearly 1.9 million Hyundai and Kia cars and SUVs were recalled in April to replace faulty brake light switches or for other reasons.

Last month, South Korea’s government ordered the recall of 100,000 Genesis sedans to fix potential rusting in anti-lock brake system that could cause brake failure. That was preceded by another brake defect that led to the recall of more than 800,000 vehicles by Hyundai and Kia.

The redesigned Genesis comes packed with new features, technology, greater leg room and other improvements.

It is Hyundai’s first all-wheel drive sedan, which should give greater stability on slippery roads and also appeal to drivers in regions with heavy snow, such as the U.S. east coast.

Hyundai used more high-strength steel for better performance and safety. About 50 percent of the new Genesis is made of high-strength steel compared with 14 percent in the older model.

Other features include a trunk that can be opened wirelessly and carbon dioxide control inside the vehicle to prevent drowsiness.

“If Hyundai can achieve its sales target without giving cash incentives, that would be a change for the better,” said Lee Hyun-soo, a Kiwoom Securities analyst.

Honda first to offer Apple's new in-car system

While some car makers are only just starting to integrate Apple’s Siri Eyes Free mode — which enables drivers to use voice commands to access their iPhone’s contacts book, make phone calls and dictate messages — Honda is racing ahead with full iOS mirroring.

The system in question, called iOS in the Car, was only officially revealed at Apple’s Developer Conference in June, but Honda is wasting no time in integrating it into its new 2014 Civic, which hits U.S. showrooms in December. iOS in the Car turns a vehicle’s integrated touchscreen display into a larger iPhone screen complete with core apps — navigation, search, music library, contacts book and inbox, plus voice command access to Siri — Apple’s ‘smart’ concierge service.

A report by ABI Research, published earlier this month, examining the future of in-car connectivity, forecasts that by 2018, 50 percent of all new cars will offer iOS in the Car as a standard feature and that demand for the system would be driven by consumers who want greater smartphone functionality and access to apps while behind the wheel.

“It is inevitable that consumers will demand to be able to use their smartphones in cars, even in luxury cars equipped with the latest top-of-the-range fully embedded infotainment systems. However, OEMs producing lower-end mass-market cars will probably invest significantly less on developing their own systems and rely more on smartphones-centric infotainment solutions,” commented Gareth Owen, principal analyst at ABI Research.

Therefore companies like BMW, Mercedes and Ferrari will be ensuring that their own systems don’t clash with that of the driver’s smartphone, while mass-market producers, such as GM, Toyota and Volkswagen will be able to enhance their own in-car offerings to executive-car standards simply by offering better smartphone integration — letting customers run their device’s version of Google Maps, for instance, streamed from a phone and to a dedicated dashboard fitted screen. And, of course, by creating their own smartphone apps.

“Car OEMs face the difficult challenges of not only how best to integrate smartphones into their vehicles, but also how to ensure that the integration strategy remains viable throughout the life of the vehicle and multiple generations of smartphones,” explains Owen.

As for iOS in the Car, 18 car companies have announced they plan to adopt the system or are at least committed to testing its capabilities. As well as Honda, they include Audi, Ferrari, Hyundai, Infiniti, Jaguar Land Rover, Mercedes-Benz, Toyota and Volvo.

Luxury carmakers target urban youth with SUV crossovers

Luxury carmakers are falling over themselves to tap into a growing trend for crossover compact SUVs, targeting young urban professionals who want a sporty feel with high-end cachet.

Porsche, Jaguar and Mercedes have all developed models of a car type which has traditionally been the preserve of middle-market standards like the Ford Escape, Dodge Durango or Toyota Highlander.

At the Los Angeles Auto Show, which opened to the public Friday, Porsche added its new Macan to the growing field of small SUVs aimed at the young and well-off who may be intimidated by the luxury brand’s more traditional — and expensive — models.

“Some years ago . . . the global demand was about 65 million vehicles a year. This is expected to grow till the end of the decade to a figure around about 100 million,” Porsche sales and marketing chief Bernhard Maier told AFP.

“So it will be an annual increase since the beginning of the decade to the end of approximately 3 percent, but the luxury part of that growing by 4.5-4.6 percent.”

Porsche had already shaked up its range with the four-wheel-drive Cayenne SUV (Sports Utility Vehicle). But the Macan is “clearly focused on those customers who are living in an urban surrounding, in bigger cities . . . but also don’t want to get rid of an SUV,” said Maier .

Anna Kleinebreil, assistant product manager for Mercedes’ GLA compact crossover which it aims to launch next autumn, said the German carmaker is aiming at a “younger group and young at heart.”

Its target customers are “people in general that have a very active lifestyle, more urban focused than some of the other SUVs,” she said.

“Because realistically speaking, none of the customers take the car off road. It’s capable of that, but it’s really meant for a more urban lifestyle,” she told AFP.

By aiming for a younger clientele, the high-end carmakers also hope to gain loyal customers who might go on to buy even more luxurious sedans, as they grow older and wealthier.

“In America, the average customer is about 52 years old for Porsche, in China it’s below 40 years” thanks to the success of the Cayenne, said Maier.

Jaguar, now owned by India’s Tata Motors, has had no other choice but to join the trend, while being careful not to compete directly with its own sister brand Land Rover, whose Range Rover was the pioneer of the luxury SUV.

In Los Angeles it presented the C-X16, a compact crossover concept car which could hit the market from 2016.

“Clearly the ambition of the brand is to grow globally, to become a more relevant and accessible proposition, beyond the sports cars and the very high-end sedans that we’re running at the moment,” said Jaguar product marketing director Steven De Ploey.

“And if you look worldwide, what is the fastest-growing segment, the segment that has the most appeal to a more progressive younger audience? You’re into the SUV and the crossover territory.”

Lincoln, Ford’s luxury brand, also has the MKC small crossover, which it hopes to use to grab some of the growing market.

“One amazing thing about this segment is, there’s a lot more conquest in this segment . . .There’s a lot more people switching brand and there is not really a dominant player, which makes it a great opportunity for us,” said Lincoln marketing director Jeff Reid.

“We really feel that this will get our demographics close to the core of the luxury market, a younger and higher-income customer,” he added.

Dim traffic sensors dull how 'smart' freeways are

California’s highways aren’t as smart as they used to be.

Buried under thousands of miles of pavement are 27,000 traffic sensors that are supposed to help troubleshoot both daily commutes and long-term maintenance needs on some of the nation’s most heavily used and congested roadways. And about 9,000 of them do not work.

The sensors are a key part of the “intelligent transportation” system designed, for example, to detect the congestion that quickly builds before crews can get out and clear an accident.

A speedy response matters: Every minute a lane is blocked during rush hour means about four extra minutes of traffic. Fewer sensors can mean slower response times, so the fact that 34 percent are offline — up from 26 percent in 2009 — creates an extra headache in California’s already-sickly traffic situation.

“(It) is not an acceptable number, really,” said California’s top transportation official, Brian Kelly.

With limited space and money for new lanes, Kelly said, maximizing flow on existing freeways is critical. To do so, planners rely on a network of cameras, above-road detectors, message boards and the in-road sensors called “loops” because of their shape.

Some loops were cut during construction, others yanked out by copper wire thieves. Many have succumbed to old age.

The resulting blind spots show up as strings of gray amid the green, yellow or red on the large map that freeway managers overseeing Los Angeles and Ventura counties monitor for signs of trouble. Even worse off than LA, according to Caltrans, are inland areas such as the San Joaquin Valley and San Bernardino and Riverside counties.

The outages are significant enough that the sensors alone cannot produce real-time traffic maps that are useful to the public. Especially when compared to the many private traffic mapping services that drivers rely on to get around.

So, to post online traffic maps that are ready for public consumption, California and other states are paying the private sector.

Caltrans gives away data from its working loop sensors to Google and other companies; Caltrans also pays Google for a traffic map that incorporates its own data as well as information the tech giant gets from vehicles and cellphones whose owners have agreed to share location data.

California’s tab is not large — Caltrans estimates it at $25,000 per year for its public-facing Quickmap — but other states are giving away sensor data and buying back reliable maps as well. Michigan’s transportation department said it pays Inrix Inc. about $400,000 annually for data to populate its Mi Drive map.

An Inrix spokesman said the company has contracts with 25 state transportation departments.

Loops are a simple technology that can last decades when properly installed. A bundle of wires under the pavement detects the size, speed and number of vehicles that pass over it, transmitting the information to a roadside box. That data records traffic in real time, but also helps planners who want to know how many of what kinds of vehicles use a road so they can project when it will start to deteriorate (more big trucks means more potholes, sooner).

Drivers may be familiar with loops at surface street intersections, where a circular cut in a turn lane means a loop will detect an idling car and tell the light to change. Replacement materials cost only a few hundred dollars — but installing a loop on a freeway can cost thousands because to embed the wire crews must close two lanes, likely off hours when labor is more expensive.

In the Fresno and San Francisco Bay areas alone, Caltrans plans to spend $35 million to fix loops sensors — as well as freeway lights, cameras, ramp meters and other electrical systems — that are down due to metal scavengers or other problems.

The state that pioneered the use of loop sensors starting in the 1970s is not alone in its struggle to keep them producing reliable data.

In Utah, transportation officials estimated about 20 percent of loops do not work.

“Does it impair our ability to make informed decisions? Certainly,” said Blaine Leonard, manager of the state’s intelligent transportation systems program.

Information from loops informs the estimated travel times posted on freeway message boards.

“If the data is bad and therefore the travel times are bad, at some point in time the public goes, ‘Well, they don’t know what they’re doing,’” Leonard said.

About 75 percent of loops In the Austin, Texas area are not working due to large-scale freeway resurfacing, according to the state department of transportation. Michigan’s transportation planners abandoned loops because they found too many failed during winter’s freeze-thaw cycle; they’ve moved to above-road sensors that use microwaves to detect traffic.

NY police go vertical to catch texting drivers

Even for a state trooper, it’s not easy to spot drivers who are texting. Their smartphones are down on their laps, not at their ears. And they’re probably not moving their lips.

That’s why New York has given state police 32 tall, unmarked SUVs to better peer down at drivers’ hands, part of one of the nation’s most aggressive attacks on texting while driving that also includes steeper penalties and dozens of highway “Texting Zones,” where motorists can pull over to use their devices.

“Look at that,” Trooper Clayton Howell says, pulling alongside a black BMW while patrolling the highways north of New York City. “This guy’s looking down. I can see his thumb on the phone. I think we got him.”

After a quick wail of the siren and a flash of the tucked-away flashers, an accountant from the suburbs is pulled over and politely given a ticket.

New York is among 41 states that ban text messaging for all drivers and is among only 12 that prohibit using hand-held cellphones. The state this year stiffened penalties for motorists caught using hand-held devices to talk or text, increasing penalty points on the driving record from three to five, along with tickets that carry fines of up to $200.

With the tough new penalties came tougher enforcement. In a two-month crackdown this summer, troopers handed out 5,553 tickets for texting while driving, compared to 924 in the same period last year.

In New York’s recent push, 91 existing rest areas and turnoffs on the state Thruway and other highways have been rebranded “Texting Zones,” some advertised with blue signs declaring “It can wait. Text stop 5 miles.”

“To our knowledge, New York is the first,” Jonathan Adkins, deputy executive director of the Governors Highway Safety Association, said of the texting turnoffs. “It’s an intriguing approach and one that we think will pay dividends and be duplicated in other states.”

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says that at any moment during daylight hours, 660,000 drivers in the United States are texting, using cellphones or otherwise manipulating electronic devices. It says more than 3,300 people were killed and 421,000 injured in crashes caused by distracted driving last year.

Major Michael Kopy, commander of the state police troop patrolling the corridor between New York City and Albany, quoted a Virginia Tech study that found texting while driving increased the chance of a collision by 23 times and took eyes off the road for five seconds — more than the length of a football field at highway speed.

Kopy worries that as teens get their driver’s licenses, texting on the road will become more prevalent. “More people are coming of driving age who have had these hand-held devices for many years, and now as they start to drive, they’re putting the two together, texting and driving, when they shouldn’t.”

Howell’s SUV, called a CITE vehicle for Concealed Identity Traffic Enforcement, is designed to catch just such drivers. Mousy gray in color, it swoops in undetected when Howell suspects a violation.

“You can see how oblivious they are to this vehicle,” Howell said as a woman holding a phone paid him no mind. “I’m right next to them, and they have no idea.”

The driver, a doctor, said she’d been running late and was on the phone to her office. It didn’t qualify as an emergency under the rules, but she got off with a warning.

The accountant who was ticketed, Chris Pecchia, of Montrose, told Howell he hadn’t been texting but rather was looking at a map displayed on his phone. He was cited anyway, for driving while using a portable electronic device.

“His story’s believable, but even a GPS has to be hands-free,” Howell said.

Pecchia said afterward: “I can’t look at a map? What’s the difference between looking at a paper map and looking at a map on the phone?”

Still, he said, he understood why the trooper pulled him over. He said he would never text while driving and has forbidden his 17-year-old daughter from doing so.

Howell pulled over a registered nurse because she had earbuds in both ears. Only one earbud is permitted while driving. She got off with a warning after explaining she was listening to her GPS’s turn-by-turn directions.

“I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt,” Howell said. “It’s my philosophy to educate, and when you pull somebody over and give them a warning, that’s a pretty good education.”

L.A. Auto Show drives new green-car market

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LOS ANGELES – If there’s a subliminal message hidden amid the flash and sizzle of this year’s Los Angeles Auto Show, it’s this: Soccer moms and macho guys can be green, too.

Automakers are extending the alternative-fuels market to buyers of family-friendly SUVs and minivans as well as sports cars and large-format pickup trucks preferred by male consumers.

Hyundai made history Thursday by announcing the first-ever mass-produced hydrogen-powered SUV, the 2014 Tucson fuel-cell model, with Toyota and Honda to follow in 2015. VIA Motors, in cooperation with Chevrolet, rolled out the first extended-range electric/solar-powered plug-in pickup truck in the world Wednesday.

If that’s too pedestrian for you, German carmakers BMW and Porsche also are getting into the green car market for the first time.

“This is like ’2001: A Space Odyssey,’” ” said David West, head of marketing for Orem, Utah-based VIA Motors. “Where the apes eat roots and the black monolith shows up and everything changes. All of a sudden, there is an electric/solar pickup truck.”

VIA’s banking on a $20 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy and a line of corporate customers from Verizon to AT&T to kick-start fleet sales of its plug-in full-scale pickups and vans. If they are successful, they’ll bombard the retail market with equal enthusiasm.

While sellers of electric pickup trucks, vans and soon — electric Cadillac Escalades — are reaching for a different kind of customer than those buying a Toyota Prius or all-electric Nissan Leaf, the real shocker from this year’s show comes from Korean automaker Hyundai.

Hyundai took its standard SUV Tucson, replaced the internal combustion engine with a fuel cell, a kind of battery device that uses hydrogen and oxygen to make electricity to power the drive train, and is selling it to soccer moms.

Instead of gasoline, the owner pumps hydrogen gas into a steel tank located in the back of the SUV, under the cargo area.

Hyundai will make the fuel-cell Tucson available to the public in the spring at its dealerships. The price will be set at $499 a month for a three-year lease, but that includes the cost of fuel and maintenance, said James Trainor, product public relations manager for Hyundai Motor America in Costa Mesa.

Trainor, who helped stage the historic car’s debut Wednesday, said there’s little difference between the regular Tucson and the fuel-cell version. Only the words “fuel cell” and “Blue Drive” are affixed to the body in silver letters. The symbol “H2” gas on the inside of the gas tank lid is the closest to saying “hydrogen power.”

He said Hyundai didn’t want to make the car look different, going in the opposite direction of the all-electric Nissan Leaf design. The fuel-cell Tucson goes 300 miles per tankful, just like the gasoline version.

“One of the top things is functionality, usefulness,” he said. “It is what people expect from their daily vehicle.”

Unlike the Leaf, with a range of about 80 miles per charge, the driver of a fuel-cell car doesn’t have to find a charging station. “With this car, the range anxiety goes away,” Trainor said.

But is it safe to ride on top of a tank full of hydrogen?

Hyundai test engineers set the car on fire, set the hydrogen tank on fire and each time there was no explosion, he said. They shot bullets into the tank and had the same result. It took a .50 caliber bullet to pierce the steel tank. What happened then? “The (hydrogen) gas escaped and that was it,” he said. No fire. No explosion. “It is as safe or safer than anything on the road today,” he said of the car.

Over at the South Coast Air Quality Management District, Matt Miyasato, deputy executive officer for science and technology, was tickled pink about Hyundai’s announcement.

“We are very happy to find these vehicles on the cusp of hitting the showrooms,” he said from his office in Diamond Bar.

The enthusiasm is easily understood for an agency trying to reduce smog in the Southland. Fuel-cell vehicles produce zero emissions. “What comes out of the tailpipe is essentially water vapor,” Miyasato said. “That will help us meet the Clean Air Act federal standards.”

Although hydrogen is mostly made from methane, it can be produced from agricultural waste, he said, even human waste. The Orange County Sanitation District runs a fuel cell from sewage waste. The hydrogen, once considered expendable, runs their fuel-cell vehicles, he said.

But not everyone thinks fuel-cell cars are the next wave.

Bob Lutz, the former vice chairman of General Motors and the man considered the “father of the Chevy Volt,” was at the show to tout the VIA extended-range pickups and vans, including one with a solar-paneled Tonneau cover. Like the Volt, the VIA full-scale pickup will get about 40 miles on a battery charge and has a gasoline-powered engine that kicks in to re-charge the battery, not move the wheels.

“I may well be wrong, but I frankly do not see hydrogen fuel-celled vehicles going anywhere,” said Lutz, 81, who sees a brighter future in extended-range electrics and in pure electrics once advancements in battery technology reach market phase.

He said UC Berkeley and General Electric are working on improving the Volt’s breakthrough lithium-ion battery by suspending the anodic and cathodic material in liquid, permitting an energy output that would triple the Volt and VIA trucks’ range.

A lithium-air battery has been produced that would extend an electric car’s range to 400 miles, he said. But so far, that battery cannot be re-charged.

“The electrification of vehicles is definitely coming. But it depends on a couple of future generations of batteries,” Lutz said.

Lutz and others experts say the biggest problem with hydrogen is the lack of infrastructure. Today, there are only nine hydrogen filling stations in the state. Gov. Jerry Brown signed a bill that will add 100 more by 2023 at a cost of $200 million per year.

“There is no infrastructure for hydrogen fuels. It would cost untold billions of dollars,” Lutz said. The exact opposite is true of electricity where power plants and power lines are already in place. Many stores, such as Walgreens and McDonald’s, are adding electric chargers to each new store parking lot.

The California Air Resources Board has established a credit system that encourages carmakers to produce alternative-fueled vehicles. Northern California-based Tesla Motors, for example, only makes all-electric (zero emission) cars, so it sells its credits to other manufacturers.

The type of zero-emission vehicle doesn’t matter to the state. Reducing smog and greenhouse gases does.

“We look at them not as competing technologies but complementary technologies,” said John Swanton, CARB spokesman. However, it’s clear that EVs have the jump on fuel-cell autos, he said.

“They are like electric vehicles were 10 years ago,” Swanton said. “EVs are for real consumers, no strings attached. With EVs you have a lot of infrastructure in place; you even have your own garage.”

Lutz, who is promoting VIA’s new electric pickups and SUVs, said larger cars turning electric make a bigger impact.

If he has any regrets about his fight to get the Volt made, it is the industry’s bent on starting with smaller vehicles. Converting pickups and large SUVs will greatly increase miles per gallon and cost savings for the consumer.

“A lot of Chevy Tahoes, Escalades and Suburbans are used by so-called soccer moms. This would get them from 15 mpg to over 100 mpg,” Lutz said. “It is where you are really, really reducing fuel use. It is like cutting a fat hog in the butt — you are going after a fat target and getting a large benefit.”

'14 Toyota Corolla restyles, adds roominess

One of the auto industry’s most familiar model names, one that has sold 40 million cars worldwide, showed up at my doorstep last week.The Toyota Corolla, now in its 11th generation, has a crisper, flashier exterior with spoiler at the rear. A piano-black grille adds distinction to the S Premium version, which was finished in a new blue crush metallic color.

The 2014 front-wheel-drive Corolla compact, which went on sale in September, has grown by 4 inches in wheelbase and overall length.

That name’s been used by Toyota since the mid-1960s, in Japan. It was introduced into the U.S. in 1968 as a ’69 model. Only the Land Cruiser name is older than the Corolla among Toyota models.

My first review of a Corolla was in May 1978, a ’78 Toyota Corolla SR-5 Liftback, featuring an easy-shifting 5-speed manual transmission. In the 35-plus years since, the wheelbase and overall length of the Corolla have grown by 13 inches.

Today’s version weighs 2,865 pounds on a wheelbase of 106.3 inches and overall length of 183 inches.

Smooth performance comes from a 132-horsepower, 1.8-liter 4-cylinder engine and continuously variable transmission.

By pushing an “S” button on the center console, for Sport setting, and use of paddle shifters, the shifts are quickened and the transmission operates more like a 7-speed automatic, somewhat overcoming the slowness of the CVT.

It’s a responsive, not sporty, handler, offers a quiet ride with comfortable front seats and delivers fuel mileage in the 30s. A week of driving, of which 60 percent was on the highway, resulted in an average of 35.3 miles per gallon; EPA estimate is 29/37. The Corolla rides on a narrow track, just under 60 inches.

Stitched leather-like Softex-trimmed seats (heated in front) and black-accented instrument panel highlighted the interior. The rear seating area is roomier this year, though the seat cushions are short. Trunk space has also been increased to 13 cubic feet, which is a bit larger than that of the rival Honda Civic sedan.

It becomes a well-equipped Corolla with Entune audio, rearview camera, moonroof and navigation with 8.1-inch touchscreen display. These pushed the sticker price to $23,570, from a base of $20,400. Two large speakers at the rear deck enhance sound throughout.

It also offers push-button start, phone book access and music streaming with Bluetooth wireless, SiriusXM radio, leather-wrapped steering wheel, automatic climate control and cruise control.

Also offered for 2014 is the Corolla LE Eco model, for which computerized valve control of the 1.8 engine raises the EPA highway estimate to 40 mpg.

The Corolla traditionally is one of the four best-selling sedans in the U.S.

A look back

Thirty-five years ago this month, I reviewed in The Denver Post the 1979 Datsun 280-ZX 2 Plus 2. Excerpts:

Datsun added a new body design and more luxurious interior to its popular “Z” cars for 1979, though it hasn’t tampered with the excellent handling, which is among the most impressive on the market. This automatic transmission, in moving from park to reverse or reverse to drive, is one of the smoothest, with absolutely no jump. The short-stroke, 168-cubic-inch 6-cylinder engine is strong at highway speeds and averaged 21.6 miles per gallon of fuel. The ride is firm, even stiff, but very smooth and the low center of gravity adds to good cornering ability. Such options as the automatic transmission, aluminum wheels, rear window wiper and washer, velour cloth upholstery and automatic speed control raised sticker price to $13,393. Among standard equipment are air conditioning and an automatic retracting power antenna. Wheelbase of the 2 Plus 2 is 99.2 inches, as opposed to only 91.3 for the smaller 280-ZX two-seater. The added rear seat is too cramped for adults, but suitable for children. But the Z car isn’t generally thought of as a family automobile anyway. The long, low sloping front end tells you that.

Notes from e-mail

I enjoyed your review of the Subaru Outback last week, Bud. I am amazed at the number of Outbacks I see every day along the Front Range. – J.S.

Mix a little bit of offbeat weather, like we have, with a little bit of unusual terrain, like we have, and it’s an ideal setting for the good-handling, all-wheel-drive Subaru. There are parts of the country, Jim, that you’ll drive miles without seeing a Subaru. Most of those areas are the fair-weather flatlands.

Network of electric car chargers stalls in California

LOS ANGELES — A New Jersey energy company required by an unusual legal settlement to build an extensive network of electric car chargers throughout California has delivered just 10 percent of what it promised in the first year.

By fortifying the state’s still-spotty charging infrastructure, the settlement between NRG Energy Inc. and California energy regulators was sold as key to jump-starting enthusiasm for the non-polluting vehicles. More places to “refuel” would diminish worries of getting stranded with a dead battery, and widespread adoption of the cars would help the state meet ambitious air quality goals.

Instead of Californians plugging in, however, progress has been plugged up: 110 of the 1,040 stations that NRG committed to installing by early December are ready.

The subsidiary responsible for building the stations, NRG eVgo, blames a series of unanticipated problems, including a reluctance among owners of malls, offices and apartment buildings to provide space for the chargers — even when the company subsidizes their cost.

The count of new stations so far, released to The Associated Press, is likely to renew concern over the settlement and whether NRG eVgo will be able to comply over its four year term. NRG eVgo said it expects a burst of activity in 2014 will bring it back on schedule.

The deal settled the state’s claims that plants co-owned by NRG overcharged for electricity during California’s power crisis a decade ago. By the end of 2016, the company is to spend $90.5 million to install at least 10,200 new charging stations statewide. Of that total, 200 will be publicly available “fast-charging” spots akin to gas stations; the other 10,000 will be slower chargers at individual parking spaces.

From the outset, skeptics suggested that the settlement doesn’t adequately compensate Californians or penalize the company for the alleged price gouging. For one, NRG keeps profits from the chargers.

“How is that a penalty? You’re giving them more locations. And they’re earning revenue from them,” said John Gartner, research director of smart transportation at Navigant Research who has followed the settlement. “Really, really weird.”

While California’s many environmentally inclined consumers may seem eager for electric cars — and, led by Gov. Jerry Brown, the state is relying on 1.5 million zero-emission vehicles by 2025 to reduce air pollution — the lack of charging stations remains a barrier.

NRG eVgo’s slow start does not seem to concern California energy regulators.

The settlement contains language that allows annual targets to be missed as long as the company is making “reasonable efforts.” Staff at the California Public Utilities Commission, which approved the deal, said they believe NRG eVgo is complying.

“You need to build in some elasticity in the timeframe because you don’t know what’s going to happen in an emerging market,” said CPUC attorney Chris Clay. “We’re optimistic that these guys will pull it off.”

If NRG eVgo doesn’t, the CPUC would receive the unspent funds, or $50,000 per station, whichever is greater, agency staff said.

In a series of interviews, NRG eVgo’s vice president of business development in California, Terry O’Day, acknowledged difficulties in the rollout but insisted “great progress” was being made.

Property owners have been surprisingly skeptical, he said, and local planning regulations can get in the way — despite the enthusiasm from leaders at the state level. Identifying and installing the first locations takes time, he said, but “site development moves more quickly” after that.

“I’m absolutely confident this is not only realistic but absolutely transformational” for air quality and electric vehicle adoption in California, O’Day said.

Soon after federal regulators approved the settlement last November, O’Day told a former president of the Electric Vehicle Association of Southern California that 15 fast-charging “Freedom Stations” should be in the ground by the end of March.

Currently, seven are operational. Under the settlement, NRG eVgo was supposed to have installed 40 such stations by Dec. 5, leading to a total of 200 by the end of 2016. Available to the public, for $10 they allow cars to go about 80 miles after 20 minutes of charging. The open stations are at five malls in the San Diego, Los Angeles and San Francisco Bay areas, and at two Whole Foods markets.

O’Day said his company has submitted permit requests or started to construct 31 more fast-charging stations and expects to pick up the pace — and expand into the San Joaquin Valley — in 2014. He said the company has 102 more potential sites targeted, though not all of those will work out.

The settlement also envisioned that by Dec. 5, there would be 1,000 “Level 2”³ chargers that supply enough electricity for 12 to 24 road miles for each hour of charging. So far, 103 are operational, including 40 at a high-end apartment complex in San Diego. By the end of 2016, 10,000 are supposed to be completed.

These chargers are available to NRG eVgo subscribers who park at apartment complexes or office buildings where the company has installed electrical infrastructure to support them. To stimulate demand, the company reduced monthly rates from $79 to about $35, plus electricity.

For Paul Scott, who sells the Nissan Leaf in Los Angeles, the chargers can’t come fast enough.

Returning late one night recently from San Diego, he ran into trouble when one fast charger was dark and a freeway closure sent him miles off his normal route. His battery ran low and at 3 a.m. he found himself waiting an hour and a half to get enough juice from a Level 2 charger to get home. A fast charger would have had him on the road in 10 minutes.

“I gotta say, we need those chargers in the ground as fast as possible,” Scott said. “I’m disappointed things haven’t happened quicker.”

Honda 2014 Accord wins 'green car' of year award

LOS ANGELES — Honda’s line of Accords won the 2014 “Green Car of the Year” award from an auto industry magazine Thursday at the Los Angeles Auto Show.

In recent years, Green Car Journal honored cars whose selling points were emerging technologies including natural gas, electric and clean diesel.

This year, the prize’s jurors — among them environmentalists and comedian/car enthusiast Jay Leno — opted to honor an already-popular model that has a gas-electric hybrid version, but also an internal combustion engine that runs on gas.

Honda’s suggested retail price for the Accord ranges from about $22,000 for a four-cylinder, gas-powered model to about $40,000 for a plug-in, gas/electric hybrid. Combined city/highway gas mileage estimates range from 28 miles per gallon to 47 miles per gallon.

Ron Cogan, the magazine’s editor and publisher, said that the Accord’s appeal is that its price and good gas mileage help make a widespread, positive impact on the environment.

Fully electric vehicles, for example, tend to be more expensive and on the road in far fewer numbers, he noted.

“It may be wonderful what you’re doing on an individual level, but your ability to make large-scale environmental impact is very small compared to a high-volume mainstream model that does it by being extremely efficient,” Cogan said.

None of the other four finalists was from a U.S.-based auto maker. They were: the Audi A6 TDI and BMW 328d, both diesels, and the gas-powered Mazda3 and Toyota Corolla.

Automakers often cite the Green Car prize in advertising.

Kia recalling over 96,000 vans to fix suspensions

Kia Motors Corp. is recalling more than 96,000 minivans in the U.S. and Canada because a suspension part can break and cause drivers to lose control of the vehicles.

The recall affects Sedona minivans from 2006 through 2012. They were sold or registered in Canada and in 20 U.S. states and Washington, D.C., where salt is used to clear roads in the winter.

The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says the lower control arms near the wheels can rust and break due to salt exposure.

Kia dealers will inspect the parts and rustproof or replace them for free starting next month.

In the U.S., the recall covers nearly 80,000 vans in Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, New Hampshire, New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Delaware, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, Ohio, Rhode Island, West Virginia or the District of Columbia. More than 16,000 Sedonas are covered in Canada.

Kia said it doesn’t know of any injuries or crashes caused by the problem.

Owners with questions can call the company at (800) 333-4542.

Mazda 3 hatchback rides like cars twice its price (review)

Who said modesty and fun can’t go hand in hand? Mazda’s latest 3 sedan and hatchback start at a humble price of around $17,700, and top out at less than $30,000 with all the options. (Those $100 all-weather floor mats? Bring ‘em on.)

Jamming over narrow, bumpy Michigan roads, the Mazda 3 doesn’t seem scrappy or harsh, like many compact cars. Rather, it hums along smoothly over ragged ridges of bad pavement, showing off a supple suspension that’s so good as to be unlikely. Mazda has sprinkled engineering magic dust into that charming chassis: it rides as well as cars twice its price.

The 2014 model year is the third generation of the 3, and it’s an especially important car for Mazda, which is a niche player compared to Japan’s behemoth brands, Toyota and Honda. The 3 is Mazda’s best-selling model in the U.S. So the all-new car, which went on sale in September, must have a broad appeal. To achieve that, Mazda offers the compact both as a four-door sedan and a five-door hatchback, with a variety of trim levels and two engine choices.

The base sedan has a 2.0-liter four-cylinder, with 155 horsepower, standard with a six-speed manual transmission. That gets 29 miles per gallon around town, and a full 41 on the freeway.

The more expensive models are available with a 2.5-liter four-cylinder with 184 horses and 185 pound-feet of torque. The downside is that, currently, it only comes with a six-speed automatic. The extra power sacrifices some efficiency, for 28 and 37 mpg in the hatchback.

It really is a shame about the transmissions, because the more potent engine would be sweeter if it were also offered with the manual for maximum driving fun. After all, Mazda has one of the better stick and clutch combos in the business.

Though the company says buyers can expect one eventually, that’s of little help to them today. And the automatic could use a seventh gear, making the shifts smoother and a little less noisy, one of the drawbacks to the otherwise quite refined car. It’s one of the loudest I’ve driven in some time, a combination of racket from the tires, wind and engine.

The good side of the 2.5 liter is it rarely feels underpowered, especially on secondary roads, where it happily wrings its little heart out.

There’s plenty of midrange punch, which is to say it’s easy to surge from 35 to 55 mph. Steering on the car is good, and the Mazda negotiates through both curves and tight spaces with precision. While it isn’t pint sized like a Fiat 500 or Smart, it fits easily into narrow parking spots.

My test car was a Grand Touring hatchback with a base price of $26,495 and $29,185 as tested. It was painted a flashy black that nicely complimented the gray rims on the 18-inch wheels.

The hatchback has the more captivating of body styles. It’s quirky, with a long, bulbous hood and a cabin placed further aft than one typically finds in a front-wheel-drive car. The sides are shapely, with an interesting interplay of contours. Compared to the last generation, the new look wins hands down.

(The compact segment used to be a barren desert design- wise, but has taken a serious turn for the better with competitors like the Ford Focus and Hyundai Elantra.)

The hatchback has plenty of room. It’s easy to pop luggage or groceries into the hatch, and I spent two hours in the rear seat with minimal complaint. My knees weren’t jammed against the seat backs, nor was my head jack-hammered into the roof liner.

Few buyers will ever buy a Mazda because of the fine qualities of its materials. The new interior design is clean and efficient, with a minimum of button clutter. However, you won’t spend much time running your hand over the leather-trimmed seats or plastic.

Plenty of electronic safety equipment is on offer, including blind-spot monitoring with rear cross-traffic alerts which come standard on the upmarket trim levels. There’s also an available lane departure warning and forward collision warning system if you’re into that kind of thing.

The car looks good, even adequately expensive, and doesn’t stint on the technology. But it’s really the overall drivability and ease of use that makes the new 3 as the new potential king of the compact cars. Pop it into sport mode and you may find yourself looking for the long way around to do errands.

The 2014 Mazda 3 S Grand Touring

Engine: 2.5-liter four-cylinder with 184 horsepower and 185 pound-feet of torque.

Transmission: Six-speed automatic.

Speed: 0 to 60 mph in about seven seconds.

Gas mileage per gallon: 28 city, 37 highway.

Price as tested: $29,185.

Best features: Good design, peppy engine.

Worst feature: Loud.

Target buyer: The shopper who wants a compact with some pizazz.

Can flying cars rescue commuters from traffic snarls?

Commuters fed up with nightmarish traffic may be getting closer to escaping the snarls in a flying car, with the latest possible exploration of the concept based in Silicon Valley.

With two companies — including one in Davis — already working on flying cars, considerable mystery surrounds the “personal aircraft” concept detailed in a patent application by Ilan Kroo, of Zee.Aero in Mountain View.

While Kroo’s application doesn’t say the proposed vertical-takeoff aircraft with foldable wings is meant to motor down roads, it includes an image of it parked between two cars, suggesting that it may be drivable as well as flyable.

Zee.Aero is in a nondescript, two-story white building with a locked door and black mesh covering its parking lot gates and fences, so it’s impossible to see inside. Its founder and CEO, Kroo, could not be reached for comment. But his background is intriguing.

A Stanford aeronautics professor, he wrote his Stanford doctoral thesis on hang gliding and then joined the advanced aerodynamics division at NASA’s Ames Research Center, before returning to Stanford as a faculty member in 1985.

Some of his previous research has focused on developing fuel-efficient aircraft, but he’s also consulted for the Department of Defense on unmanned drone projects and for private aircraft manufacturers including Boeing and Aerion. Kroo also started an earlier company, Desktop Aeronautics, that sold aviation-related software and was bought by Aerion in 2012.

It’s unclear who is funding Kroo’s current venture. Zee.Aero’s offices are in an industrial area a few miles from NASA Ames and the headquarters of Google, whose founders have an intense interest in aviation and space exploration. A building near Zee.Aero sports a Google sign. But Kroo told the San Francisco Chronicle, which reported on the patent Thursday, that his company is not affiliated with the search giant.

If he actually plans to make a vehicle that can maneuver through city traffic as well as zoom far above it, he’s got some catching up to do. Two other companies are well along in the flying-car development process.

The company apparently closest to offering a version for sale is Terrafugia of Woburn, Mass. It flew and drove the craft, dubbed Transition, at a Wisconsin air show this summer and hopes to begin delivering them to customers by 2016, according to Vanessa Blakeley, a business development associate with the company.

She said Terrafugia already has received more than 100 $10,000 deposits from interested buyers of the two-seat vehicle, which is expected to cost $279,000. Outfitted with folding wings so it can be parked in a residential garage, the Transition has a gasoline automobile engine that gets 35 miles per gallon when powering its rear wheels on land and can hit 115 miles per hour after taking off with its rear-mounted propeller from an airport.

It’s designed to meet federal requirements for a light sport aircraft, a category of single-engine craft that includes powered parachutes, balloons and gliders, which typically weigh no more than 1,320 pounds and require much less training to pilot than a regular plane.

It’s also configured to meet government automobile safety standards, according to Blakeley, who said it has a federally approved windshield and tires, a roll cage, dual air bags and “a crumple zone” to absorb crashes.

The other company working on a flying car is Moller International of Davis, which was incorporated in 1983 but has been working on the concept since the 1960s. Its proposed, four-passenger Skycar 400 is a vertical-takeoff craft using fan ducts instead of helicopter blades and is designed to hit air speeds of up to 375 miles per hour.

Bruce Calkins, Moller’s general manager, said the idea behind the Skycar is for a person to drive it a short distance from their home and then fly from a cul-de-sac, shopping center or some other location approved for helicopter-like takeoffs. Although the craft has been test flown while attached to a tether, he said the company hopes to conduct an untethered flight with a person on board in the next 18 months.

He declined to speculate when the Skycar might be for sale, noting the company has had money troubles and needs a major investor to finance production of the planes, which are expected to cost “around $500,000.” Because it has taken so long to develop the craft, Calkins said Moller has returned deposits to many people who plunked down money in the 1980s hoping to buy it.

Over the years, a number of others — including the Defense Department — have toyed with developing a vehicle that can drive down a road and also fly. Most have at least temporarily abandoned the idea. But despite Moller’s financial troubles, Calkins said the company has never given up its quest.

Noting that as many as a dozen companies were working on flying-car concepts 15 years ago, he added, “there’s really only a couple of us left in the business.”

How your car might stop you from drunk driving, bad choices

WASHINGTON — The government is speeding up research on safety systems that automatically prevent drivers from operating their cars if they are drunk or aren’t properly buckled in.

Officials expect to decide by year’s end how to encourage automakers to make some special safety systems already in certain high-end vehicles available in more cars, they said last Thursday. Those systems warn drivers before a collision that they are about to run into another vehicle and can brake automatically to avoid a crash or make it less severe.

The innovations — collision avoidance, seat belt interlocks and driver alcohol detection systems — hold the potential of dramatically reducing traffic fatalities, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

As they looked ahead to emerging safety technologies, officials released data showing the first increase in highway fatalities since 2005. There were 33,561 traffic deaths in 2012, or 1,082 more than the year before.

Despite the government’s best efforts, some Americans are still driving drunk, driving distracted and not wearing seat belts, David Strickland, the agency’s head, told reporters in a conference call.

“These technologies are in within reach,” he said. “They address the top three highway safety threats. They have the potential to significantly decrease those deaths. We only need the will to act.”

The 3 percent increase in highway fatalities may be due in part to last year’s unusually warm winter, which lengthened the motorcycle riding season. Seventy-two percent of the increase occurred in the first three months of the year. Most of those involved were motorcyclists or pedestrians, the government said.

Preliminary data so far this year indicates traffic deaths may be dropping again, Strickland said.

The seat belt interlocks would prevent cars and trucks from being driven when the driver or a passenger isn’t buckled in properly. The agency said this potentially could save about 3,000 people a year.

The agency is examining whether it should change safety standards to allow automakers to use the devices to satisfy current government requirements for occupant protection in crash tests.

Automakers have indicated they’d prefer to install automatic systems that ensure all occupants are belted, which is cheaper than spending money on designing the interiors of cars and trucks to ensure unbelted occupants, who get thrown around in collisions, aren’t injured, Strickland said. The safety administration is trying to determine whether the interlocks can be made tamper-proof and highly reliable.

The “driver alcohol detection system” differs from devices already required by some states for drivers arrested or convicted of drunken driving. In those cases, drivers usually have to take some step — often breathing into a tube — to test their blood alcohol content before starting the car.

Detection systems such as those NHTSA is researching with automakers don’t require any action on the driver’s part except putting his hands on the steering wheel, pushing a start button with a finger or simply breathing. The systems can detect through touch or air samples whether the driver’s blood alcohol content is above the .08 legal limit. The idea is to eventually include the systems as standard or optional equipment in new vehicles, regardless of whether the driver has a history of drunken driving.

“The automatic system would be enabled every time the car is started, but unobtrusive so it would not pose an inconvenience to the non-intoxicated driver,” the agency said.

The technology is still at least five years away, Strickland said.

There were 10,322 people killed in drunken driving crashes last year, a 4.6 percent increase over 2011, the agency said. Most of the drivers involved had a blood alcohol content of 0.15 or higher, nearly double the legal limit. “Such technology could save thousands of these victims every year,” the agency said.

After six years of declines, the increase in drunken driving deaths is “alarming,” said Jan Withers, president of Mothers Against Drunk Driving. “This news is frustrating because we know what works, and we know how to stop these senseless tragedies.”

The collision avoidance systems address one of the most common types of auto accidents. Last year, one-third of all police reported crashes that started with one vehicle striking the rear end of another vehicle, the agency said.

Motorcycle deaths were up 7.1 percent last year, the third annual increase. Pedestrians also experienced a large increase in fatalities, 6.4 percent. A majority of pedestrian deaths occur in urban areas at night and involve alcohol, often with pedestrians stepping into the street in the middle of the block rather than at intersections.

Follow Joan Lowy on Twitter at @AP_Joan_Lowy.

Lexus debuts new sports coupe with goal to broaden appeal

The luxury Japanese car company hopes that the RC coupe will broaden the brand’s appeal when it makes its first official public appearance at the upcoming Tokyo motor show.

Described as a “concept-to-reality” coupe — meaning that with a few tweaks and changes a production version will be hitting the road in the not too distant future — the RC is a concerted attempt by Toyota’s luxury division to boost its desirability among existing customers and those new to Lexus.

The company is yet to publish any performance statistics, but has confirmed that it will be officially unveiled at the Tokyo Motor Show on November 20 with two engine choices, a 3.5-liter V6 and a 2.5-liter hybrid powerplant, both of which will highlight the car’s “fun-to-drive” character.

For now, Lexus wants us to focus on its appearance and it is certainly striking, thanks to prodigious use of sharp, angular intersecting lines, however, the huge front grille is bound to polarize opinion. What is certain though is that it will have a level of build quality and reliability to match anything currently being manufactured in Germany.

This reputation for quality has helped Lexus to become a serious competitor to BMW, Mercedes, Audi and Cadillac in the luxury car market. However, until now, its sportier offerings — with the notable exception of its LFA supercar — have left a lot to be desired.

Despite an eventual price tag of $445,000 the LFA was so technologically advanced it required 10 years of research and development time, meaning that the company actually made a loss on each of the 500 examples it offered for sale.

If The RC Coupe offers just a smidgen of the performance, handling and thrills of the LFA, then most drivers will be able to look past that huge grille.

White replaces silver as favorite car color

Move over, silver.

After more than a decade as the world’s favorite car color, silver is falling in popularity to white. PPG Industries, the leading supplier of automotive paints, says 25 percent of the vehicles it supplied in the 2013 model year were white, up 3 percent from the prior year. Silver and black tied for second, with 18 percent each.

White dominates in Europe, North America and Asia. Only in South America is silver still king.

Apple Inc., with its all-white stores and gadgets, made white a high-tech color. The variety of whites — from flat shades to creamy pearls — is also contributing, says Jane Harrington, PPG’s manager of automotive color styling.

But if you don’t relish a whiteout on the freeway, never fear. Automakers are currently scouting colors for the 2016 and 2017 model years, and Harrington is showing them some eye-popping options, from a pink-tinged bright red developed in Asia to a rich dark gray with faint green highlights.

Eleven different browns — from light copper to dark chocolate — and an equal number of grays are part of PPG’s annual color show for automakers at its automotive center in the Detroit suburb of Troy. There are six yellows and seven greens, from seafoam to dark olive. One notable absence: Powder blue, which is increasingly confined to electric cars or hybrids.

Harrington and her international team determine color trends by watching fashion, architectural paint colors and other predictors. She thinks we’ll see more deep jewel tones like teal and more earthy metallics, like reddish orange, in the coming years. With the end of the recession, drivers don’t mind being showy again, she says

Car buyers could also see taxi-like yellows and other flat, bright colors, which are growing in popularity thanks to small, funky entries like the Kia Soul.

Pastel tones, like mint green and very light pink, are also in the mix.

PPG will take its color tour on the road to Los Angeles, Europe and Asia and will then start working with individual automakers on their choices. Companies typically choose eight to 10 colors for every model. PPG won’t say how many cars it supplies paint for each year, but it works with every major car company.

“They think about the vehicle and how that color will translate,” Harrington said. “That color, sparkle and finish helps define the car’s character.”

Tesla tweaks Model S to stave off recall seen as damaging image

Tesla Motors, under U.S. scrutiny for vehicle-fire risk, is seeking to head off a months- long investigation that could lead to expensive upgrades and longer-term damage to the image of electric cars.

Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk said Tuesday on his blog that the company made a software adjustment to its Model S sedan so it won’t ride as low to the ground at highway speed, reducing the risk of battery packs being punctured and catching fire after hitting objects in the road. His remarks preceded a National Highway Traffic Safety Administration statement that it would investigate the Model S over two such fires.

Should regulators reject the software fix, they may order Palo Alto, California-based Tesla to install a thicker barrier of aluminum or a stronger metal in the Model S’s undercarriage. That would be much more costly and undermine Tesla’s claim to sell the safest U.S. car, one priced from $70,000 to more than $100,000.

“With these high-technology vehicles, a recall is the particularly dreaded end game,” said Bill Visnic, senior editor at Edmunds.com, an auto-information website based in Santa Monica, California. “Musk understands that.”

The U.S. investigators who will decide whether to allow Musk to head off a recall on his terms are with the same agency that rebuked the company two months ago for exaggerating the Model S’s government crash-test results.

Tuesday, Musk framed the safety questions surrounding the Model S as a threat to “delay the advent of sustainable transport and increase the risk of global climate change, with potentially disastrous consequences worldwide.”

Avoiding a recall is more than a matter of semantics. If a consumer searches NHTSA’s database, it won’t find any listings for a 2011 recall of General Motors Co. Chevrolet Volt, since GM acted before one was requested.

After a Volt caught fire on a storage lot following a government crash test, GM offered to better shield the lithium- ion batteries from puncture and exchange the cars if owners didn’t want them. The company’s top executive started driving a Volt. Regulators agreed the repairs were sufficient and ended their probe.

Tesla’s software upgrade is “very benign” in terms of cost and production disruption, and probably will be acceptable to NHTSA, Rod Lache, an analyst at Deutsche Bank, said in a note Tuesday.

Tesla shares had fallen 35 percent through Tuesday since reaching a closing peak of $193.37 on Sept. 30, the day before the first fire.

If NHTSA requires more, such as replacing or improving the undercarriage barrier, Model S owners may have to return their vehicles to be fixed at company expense.

“Compare the skid plate on a SUV or a pickup,” Dave Sullivan, an analyst at AutoPacific Inc., said in interview. “Those are all made from steel today, very thick-gauge steel, and they protect the underbody components, whether it’s transfer cases or oil pans. Nobody makes any of those things from aluminum. They’re just not as durable.”

Liz Jarvis-Shean, a Tesla spokeswoman, said NHTSA already has extensive information on the battery pack and lithium-ion cells used in the Model S. She declined to comment on possible modifications the company might consider, including reinforcing the battery’s protective aluminum casing.

“It’s too early in the process to speculate about that,” Jarvis-Shean said in a phone interview.

Musk predicted last week that there would “definitely” be no recall. In statements and posts on Twitter, he has criticized media coverage and said fires have been much more prevalent in gasoline-powered cars.

He said on his blog Tuesday that the company asked NHTSA to start the investigation, which agency Administrator David Strickland disputed in remarks to reporters in Washington. Both said the investigation began Nov. 15; they disagreed on who acted first.

“The notion that a manufacturer would ask the agency to open a formal investigation is so unusual as to defy credulity,” said Allan Kam, a safety consultant and former senior enforcement attorney with NHTSA. “The meat doesn’t come to the grinder.”

NHTSA in August criticized Tesla in a press release for claiming it received a 5.4-star rating in crash tests on the Model S, a rating the agency said doesn’t exist. The Model S did receive the highest possible rating — five stars in each aspect of the test.

The agency has a history of taking companies to task when officials believed their actions were mischaracterized or exaggerated.

In 1988, NHTSA’s then-deputy administrator, Jeffrey Miller, criticized the maker of the Suzuki Samurai for saying the agency supported the company’s claim that “the Samurai is safe and should put to rest the inaccurate and misleading attacks on the vehicle.”

While the agency ended its investigation into the Samurai’s alleged propensity to roll over, Miller said the agency never said the Samurai was safe or had no safety-related defects.

Ford Motor Co. got a similar rebuke in 1998, after NHTSA closed an investigation into the Bronco II sport-utility vehicle. The agency said it made the decision based on whether it could build enough evidence to force a recall.

Toyota Motor Corp. vigorously defended much of its product lineup in 2009 and 2010 before recalling a record number for defects that may cause unintended acceleration. Both the GM and Toyota defects led to congressional hearings.

Most automakers do more to build influence in Washington than Tesla does.

Musk’s company has maintained only a nominal lobbying presence for the past two years, reporting expenditures of less than $5,000 every three months, disclosure reports show. It spent more in previous years when it sought the U.S. Energy Department loan that helped finance the Model S’s development. Tesla repaid the $465 million loan in full earlier this year.

The brashness that helps Musk’s credibility with investors isn’t likely to sway NHTSA, as the agency is under examination almost as much as the automakers over its handling of the Toyota recalls, Visnic said.

“The last thing you want to do with NHTSA right now is tell them their business,” Visnic said. “Musk is not going to talk his way out of this.”

Hot cars at the 2013 Los Angeles Auto Show

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The Los Angeles Auto Show opens to the public Friday after two days of media previews. Here are some of the most buzz-worthy vehicles being introduced at this year’s show:

BMW 4 SERIES CONVERTIBLE

BMW adds a convertible to its 4 Series line of two-door coupes, which debuted over the summer. The 4 Series replaced the 3 Series coupe; BMW is now reserving the 3 Series name for four-door sedans. The convertible, which goes on sale in the U.S. early next year, has a three-piece retractable hardtop that can be automatically lowered in 20 seconds at low speeds. To keep away the chill, the car has optional neck warmers in the driver and passenger seats. As in the 4 Series coupe, there are two engine choices: a turbocharged 2.0-liter four-cylinder with 240 horsepower in the 428i and a 3.0-liter turbocharged inline six-cylinder with 300 horsepower in the 435i. Both have an eight-speed automatic transmission. The 428i is offered as a rear-wheel-drive or an all-wheel-drive, while the 435i is only offered as a rear-wheel-drive. The 428i starts at $49,675, around $8,000 more than the starting price of the coupe. The 435i starts at $55,825.

PORSCHE MACAN

Porsche is entering the fast-growing small SUV market with the Macan. The Macan — the name comes from the Indonesian word for “tiger” — is six inches shorter than its sibling, the Cayenne SUV, but features the same muscular look. It also uses some tricks to look more substantial, like a broad, wraparound hood that encompasses the headlights. Porsche designed two versions: The Macan S, with a new, 3.0-liter V6 engine that gets 340 horsepower and the Macan Turbo, with a new 3.6-liter V6 that gets 400 horsepower. Standard features include an off-road mode, which adjusts the torque, shifter and other functions for off-roading at the touch of a button. There’s an optional air suspension chassis, which can set the vehicle’s ground clearance at three different levels. Porsche says the feature is unique to the Macan among small SUVs. The Macan goes on sale this spring at a starting price of $50,895 for the Macan S and $73,295 for the Macan Turbo. Sales of small luxury SUVs are up 25 percent so far this year, making them the fastest-growing segment in the luxury market.

FORD EDGE CONCEPT

Ford says its Edge concept vehicle previews the design direction and technology of the company’s future SUVs. The lines on the concept are sharper and more angled than the current Edge, and it adopts the trapezoidal grille shape and narrow headlights of Ford’s newer products. Advanced safety features include an automated parking system that can find and park in a perpendicular space. The system can even be activated remotely, pulling the car out of a tight spot before the driver gets in. The Edge concept also will automatically steer away from obstacles and brake to avoid a collision. The Edge mid-size SUV has recently been overshadowed by Ford’s newer SUVs, including the small Escape and larger Explorer. This will be the Edge’s first full redesign since it was introduced in 2007. The new Edge will also target a global audience — it will be sold in Europe, China and South America for the first time. Ford isn’t yet saying when the new Edge will go on sale, but it’s likely to arrive sometime next year.

JAGUAR F-TYPE COUPE

The F-Type convertible, which went on sale in the spring, was Jaguar’s first two-seat sports car in 50 years. Now the company’s adding a hardtop version. The 2015 F-Type coupe, which goes on sale this spring, starts at $65,000, or $4,000 less than the convertible. The base model of the all-aluminum coupe — made, in part, from recycled metal — has a 340-horsepower V6 engine and a top speed of 161 mph. For $77,000, buyers can upgrade to a V6 with 380 horsepower and a top speed of 171 mph. At the top of the lineup is the $99,000 F-Type R, which has a 550-horsepower V8 engine and goes from zero to 60 mph in four seconds. It has a top speed of 186 mph. All versions have an eight-speed transmission and a hidden rear spoiler that automatically rises at 70 mph and tucks back in at 50 mph or less. Jaguar’s U.S. sales are up 36 percent so far this year, thanks to the F-Type convertible and the recently redesigned XF sedan.

MERCEDES VISION GRAN TURISMO/GLA45 AMG CONCEPTS

The Vision Gran Turismo super sports car, with its wild and fluid lines and extreme proportions, will draw viewers to Mercedes’ stand at the Los Angeles Auto Show. The Gran Turismo is pure fantasy, designed for the PlayStation racing game Gran Turismo 6. The virtual model (a scale model of the show car, complete with Mercedes’ signature gull-wing doors) will be available for download next month. While a car like this won’t ever be produced, look for some of the design elements — like the LED lights that replace louvers on the grille — on future super sports cars. The GLA45 AMG concept, a small SUV from Mercedes’ AMG performance division, is closer to reality. Like Porsche and Lincoln, Mercedes is entering the fast-growing, compact luxury SUV market with its upcoming GLA series. The GLA45 concept has a 2.0-liter, turbocharged four-cylinder engine with 355 horsepower. No word on when it will hit the market.

VOLKSWAGEN E-GOLF

Volkswagen announced that its first fully electric car, the e-Golf, will go on sale in the U.S. at the end of 2014. The e-Golf is based on the seventh-generation gasoline-powered Golf, which is headed to the U.S. this spring. VW says the new Golf was designed from the outset to house either a gas engine or an electric motor and battery. The e-Golf, which will be a five-door hatchback, has a 115-horsepower electric motor and a 264-cell lithium-ion battery that’s tucked into the frame beneath the front and rear passenger seats. Both the motor and the battery were developed by Volkswagen in Germany. Volkswagen says the car can go 70 to 90 miles on a charge, depending in part on which of three modes (normal, eco or eco-plus) the driver selects. Among its energy saving features are a special pump that uses heat from the driving components — instead of the battery — to warm the cabin and Volkswagen’s first standard LED headlights. VW says the e-Golf will be sold, at first, in states that have adopted zero-emission vehicle targets, including California, Connecticut, New York, Oregon and Maryland. Pricing hasn’t been announced.

Federal watchdogs tighten crash safety advertising rules

A U.S. safety agency is tightening the guidelines that control how automakers use government crash tests in advertising.

The change by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration was prompted by Tesla Motors Inc., the Palo Alto, Calif., electric car company. Tesla has promoted its electric Model S as the safest car in America, saying it earned a 5.4-star rating from the government.

The new guidelines stress that NHTSA doesn’t give crash-test ratings higher than five stars. The agency says automakers who claim ratings higher than that are misleading the public.

“Tesla’s claim was an example of the potential confusion and inaccuracy that could be caused by incorrect use of the five-star ratings information in advertising and marketing statements,” NHTSA said Wednesday in a statement. “As a result, NHTSA reviewed its advertising guidelines and made updates to ensure consumers receive accurate and consistent information.”

Companies that don’t follow the guidelines could see “buyer alert” warnings from the government. They could also be kicked out of the ratings program or be referred to other agencies for further, unspecified action.

NHTSA Administrator David Strickland said Wednesday on the floor of the Los Angeles Auto Show that the agency needed an enforcement mechanism to make sure all automakers follow the rules. He said Tesla prompted the change, but other manufacturers that he didn’t identify also have violated the guidelines.

A Tesla spokeswoman would not comment Wednesday. On Tuesday, the automaker’s website featured a headline that said the Model S was the safest car in America. But by Wednesday afternoon, the site had been revised. “The highest safety rating in America,” the headline said, with a smaller headline saying the Model S has a five-star rating in all categories, which is accurate.

NHTSA on Tuesday opened an investigation into battery fires in two Model S cars in the U.S. Both struck metal road debris that punctured the batteries and touched off fires. No one was hurt in either fire, and no decision has been made on whether there will be a recall.

Tesla shares, which had risen more than 400 percent earlier in the year, have fallen close to 40 percent since the first fire was reported in early October. They closed Wednesday down $4.98, or 4 percent, at $121.11.

Ferrari FF coupe: Exotica, high performance, and a back seat (review)

Some people hate it, refuse to call it a Ferrari. Many of those people are my colleagues in the automotive media, men and women, who, like me, derive income from driving other people’s cars.

We are self-acclaimed experts in matters of the automobile — especially concerning expensive, exotic automobiles such as Ferrari, Lamborghini, McLaren, Aston Martin and Porsche.

What’s odd about that is that many of us can’t afford to buy much above a Ford Focus or Toyota Camry. Journalism, especially automotive journalism, doesn’t pay much.

But let’s get back to that often-scorned Ferrari, the hatchback Ferrari FF coupe, the subject of this week’s column. It actually is a 2012 model, which is of minor importance, because Ferrari is more artisan than manufacturer in turning out cars.

That means the company takes its time producing precious art pieces endowed with four wheels, clever and expensive chassis arrangements, and super-powerful engines. The FF, for example, comes with a 6.3-liter gasoline V-12 delivering a maximum 651 horsepower and 504 pound-feet of torque.

Like most Ferrari cars, it makes little sense as a daily driver. The thing moves from 0 to 60 miles per hour in 3.8 seconds. Legally, there are few places to drive the FF in the world’s urban and suburban communities the way it is engineered to be driven.

But that is the romance and lore of Ferrari automobiles. They always have been the motorized definition of exclusivity, luxury, high-performance motoring and sheer impracticality — until now, with the emergence of the hatchback FF.

Hatchback cars are antithetical to all things Ferrari, all things exotic automobile. Hatchbacks are the essence of practicality. Most seat at least four adults, with two rear seats that can fold downward. In the case of the FF, folding those seats down provides 28.3 cubic feet of cargo space, effectively turning a sports car into a station wagon.

Ferraris are notoriously fast, sleek, sexy automobiles. They are, for those of you who remember her, Sophia Loren, and, for those of you who don’t remember the gloriously sensuous Ms. Loren, think: Beyonce, Jennifer Lopez, Rihanna, Padma Lakshmi, Janelle Monae, Maggie Grace, Jordana Brewster or Azealia Banks.

In short, Ferraris are deliciously beautiful cars, even more so because of their expense and gross impracticality. They are best viewed as wheeled fantasy, mobile art.

But the real world intervenes. The gossip magazines note that beautiful women have sex and sometimes get pregnant. Paparazzi are all agog over “baby bumps,” as if, zounds, even stunningly beautiful women can have swollen bellies!

With the FF, sexism has morphed into Ferrari-ism. How dare that famed maker of Italian super-performance automobiles acknowledge that even rich people (in this case, the 5 percent of the U.S. population who can afford the FF’s base price of $295,000) often have families. And despite annual incomes of $300,000 or more, those people don’t want to spend $258,000 on a two-seat Ferrari Italia convertible or $229,000 on a two-seat Ferrari Italia coupe.

Times have changed. Hedonism, albeit stubbornly, is making room for practicality. Welcome the “baby bump” hatchback Ferrari FF (does that stand for Family Ferrari?) Coupe!

In service of the family, the FF coupe makes less sense than many cars, wagons and crossover-utility vehicles available for substantially less. But it conceivably could have a great deal of appeal for wealthy people in need of rationalizing the expenditure of big bucks in pursuit of unbridled power on the road.

To wit:

• A family of four can sit within the FF’s exotic-leather-and-wood-trimmed confines.


• The FF, equipped with all-wheel drive, can go in snow, ice, or rain.


• A pleasant long-distance ride can be had by adjusting the FF’s suspension to “Comfort.”


• The true Ferrari nature of the FF — tight handling, breathtaking acceleration — readily comes to life if you adjust the suspension to “Sport.” Alas, ride in that mode is less pleasant for passengers, particularly those in the two rear seats.


• Yes, the FF can and does outrun practically everything on U.S. highways. The problem is that too many other drivers know that. The less mature among them are always riding your tail, trying to goad you to go even faster. Warning: Do not oblige them. A traffic enforcement officer is almost always watching.


• Yes, the FF has a “baby bump,” which tends to destroy fantasy by indicating inescapable reality and a certain level of responsibility. The “bump,” in this case, is in the rear. It offers ample seating space for two adults and enough cargo space for their stuff.

Still, the FF is every bit a Ferrari — one designed and engineered to transport more than the driver’s ego.