The Future Of American Cars

What will the future be like? The future of the car has been a favorite topic of TV shows and cartoons for years

. How did you imagine we would travel in the year 2010? The self-driven taxi from Total Recall? Hovering craft like in Star Wars? The sky was the limit, literally, for what cars would look like.

That isn't the direction that technology has taken. Cars already do what we need them to do. Hovering would be cool, but wouldn't really serve any other purpose. Cars already have sufficient speed that the highway patrol has to try to slow people down. In fact, in many places there's so much traffic that cars can't use the speed they already have. Although we do want good looking cars, consumers are choosing cars that look good, but pretty boring. Even spoilers are usually understated and painted the same color as the car. Auto makers tout the vehicles' reliability and safety records, which has improved exponentially in recent years.

So what do we need from our cars that we don't have? Fuel efficiency - even more practicality. The price of gasoline has soared in recent years, and it's expensive just to drive around town. Cars that run on less gasoline, or none at all, are the hot sellers. Automakers have a lot of choices for reaching this goal, from hydrogen to biofuel to propane. None of these technologies is perfect yet, especially economically.

In the last few years, one technology has taken the lead and reached the car dealership: electricity. Hybrids have been here for a while, and fully electric cars are appearing now. The Toyota Prius was the first to be offered at a price that large numbers of consumers could afford. The other automakers followed closely on their heels. Choices now include the Infiniti M35, Nissan Altima, Ford Escape and Honda Civic. Hybrids don't have to be small anymore, either, as evidenced by GMC's Sierra and Cadillac's Escalade. The government has helped by offering incentives to those involved in manufacturing or buying cars that use less gasoline and are less damaging to the environment. You can go buy one of these cars today at your local car dealership with no problem.

The fully electric car is the next wave. You've seen them for quite a while, in experimental cars owned by the local power company or as spec cars at car shows. Finally cars like the Nissan Leaf and the Chevy Volt are hitting showrooms. New cars are clearly headed in this direction despite unresolved issues like price of batteries and limited range.

Good old fashioned fuel efficiency is getting overlooked to some degree. A car can run on gasoline, but use a lot less of it. This is a technology that's been slowly but steadily improving for many years. Look at the non-hybrid version of the Honda Civic, which gets 34 MPG or the Ford Focus with its 35 MPG highway. This was unimaginable back in the 80's when gas was only $1.35 a gallon and we loved our V8s.

So while we're unlikely to see cars like the DeLorean from Back to the Future or Kitt from the Knight Rider, cars will continue to evolve to meet our ever-changing needs. America's love affair with the automobile is far from over.

by: Hannah Valez

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