Daily Archives: July 23, 2012

Ford promises to cut traffic jams with Traffic Jam Assist


Unfortunately, it won’t be ready for the Olympics, but Ford reckons it can offer a car that automatically drives itself in traffic jams by 2017 – and the company says that will dramatically cut delays.Ford says that studies have found that where 25 percent of vehicles on a stretch of road are equipped to automatically follow the traffic ahead, journey times can be reduced by 37.5 percent and delays reduced by 20 percent. Apparently, we get so bored and frustrated that we lose concentration and miss opportunities to keep up with the car in front.

Goodwood Revival – The Once and Future Motor show


The Goodwood Revival Earls Court Motor Show will feature British sports cars this year, given the huge number of anniversaries coming up. The idea of the show is to give people the idea that they are walking into the Earls Court Show from sometime in the 1950s or early 1960s. Inside they will see a timewarp motor show featuring celebrations of half-centuries for the Lotus Elan, MGB and Triumph Spitfire, 60 years of the Triumph TR2, and 40 years of the Jensen-Healey, amongst others. These will be joined by a wealth of other iconic and desirable British sports cars, ranging from pre-War Bentley and ACs, through to 21st Century machines.

VW to buy Proton?


VW is said to be considering yet another bid for marginal car brand, Proton, according to industry website just-auto.com. Proton was set up basically as a vanity project by Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir to demonstrate that Malaysia was a modern country. It did well at first by assembling Mitsubishi Lancers, but suffered from delusions of competence, and did more of its own engineering over the years, with the result that quality fell through the floor. UK market share has fallen from 1% in 1992 to 0.02% last year.