SAmadei

Too much nose. I don't understand why these won the NYC taxi of the future contest... to me, all that nose is very wasteful, space-wise. Otherwise, its ugly... just like all the other Eurovans. I'm just glad I already have a van... guess I'll be holding onto it forever.

$4500 is a fair price for a more-or-less new car... but no more. I wouldn't want it, as I prefer the '93-'97... and I'd want a car I can cut up, and convert to a RWD sleeper.

Even the cheapest piece of crap Versa is more than $10,000. No sane person aspires to own one, certainly not teens. Not only that, even being a band new car there's the costs of maintaining and insuring it associated. I don't know about you but when I was 16 I didn't have 10 grand handy. As well, not everyone in cities have places to store cars beyond public roads, which as I mentioned before, will likely get them dinged up. Going the used route is an option, but there again you have the costs of insuring and maintenance, plus the costs of repairs the car will need at some point. The amount of people who put off important repairs on their cars or do it with the cheapest, lowest quality parts is startling, but its because often times they can't afford it. Also, as the article mentions, kids are still interested in cars, but those are dream cars like 911's not Cruzes. And for 95% of them, its going to stay a dream. Sure, you're more mature... but that has little bearing on your actual driving acumen. Most accidents are the result of inattention, carelessness or driving while intoxicated or tired. For all the hype about people hooning around or road rage, which even older drivers do, they result in few accidents (but they create spectacular ones when they do). If you are a young driver, you will have bad habits that need correction, and will only get corrected over time by making mistakes. The bottom line is that statistically, you are a risk in your first couple years, reguardless of age... thats why insurance companies want to know how many years you've been driving when they quote you. My friend who got her license at 28 paid more per month than I did when I was 22. When you get older, you are going to group all 18-29 year olds in the same maturity level... many of my friends made their worst mistakes in their mid-20s.

I've been impressed by the number of NV vans I've seen on the roads.

Well, it was 13 years ago. I remember buying gas for $1.07 in late '98/early '99 and thinking it was something of nirvana. Unfortunately, the reality of 1999 seems to have been distorted in way too many ways to get to 2012 that its hard to put it on a baseline with today's reality.

And if you live in the 95% of the US where public transportation is awful, I guess you just walk or stay home and "go to" college online. Bunch of socialites that will breed. We've made cars expensive by insisting that we have insurance, fully optioned premium vehicles, and heavy, yet tiny cars with too much technology... all these cars are a lot more expensive to fix and fuel, and then we removed a whole bunch of perfectly fine affordable vehicles with cash for clunkers. We have allowed ourselves to be priced out by our greed, politicians and the auto, energy and insurance conglomerates. Removing that age group would result in 19-21 year olds having the highest accident rate. Remove them and 22-25 would be highest. Remove them and 25-30 would be highest. Remove them and 31-39 would be highest. Its not the age, its the years of driving experience... even though mostly everyone out there seems awful, they would be TEN TIMES WORSE if they were all rank beginners. You want less people on the road? Make everybody get retested for a driver's license exam that 98% fail.

Sounds like a '73 or earlier. I don't like the '74 and later coffin-nose Matadors... only the coupes. From Wiki, it almost sounds like your example...

A good strategy, as Chrysler really needs more product, but GM's Buick plan is starting to trend downward... Buick has had 4 months of consecutive months of year-over-year sales losses and has failed to clear the 200K yearly sales point for about a decade. I'm amazed that Chrysler is outselling Buick in NA by about 50K units a year with 2~3 fewer products.

Update... the 500 is starting to become much more popular in Brooklyn/NYC. I think I've seen about 8 in the last couple days. Brings my total to 11. The yellow one really popped. Still looking for an Abarth.

This writing was on the wall since the 200 was designated. Just hope Chrysler does this right... this is a slippery slope to turning the Chrysler brand into DeStoto or Plymouth...

The spiritual successor to the Magnum wagon... of course, one would be better off to get a older Hornet wagon with a 304.

Yeah, something tells me the paint on the horizontal surfaces was sunburned to oblivion. I'd say this is good at $2200, assuming its not full of bondo. But I imagine it has bondo.

I like the idea... just as I liked the idea that GM treat Pontiac as such.

Cheers. Not many of these left.

But lower..w/ more car-like height....would be an interesting project for a customizer to build a modern Fleetwood Brougham off an Escalade platform...or a Sixteen-like vehicle. It's too bad the Sixteen was never built..what a shape. I love this idea. I'd drive a Escalade coupe or convertible dropped in the weeds in a heartbeat.

The serious corrosion problems where all early on... 1976/77. By '78, IIRC, Chrysler had completely switched to using galvanized steel for the problem areas. I never warmed up to the later taillights on these... they looked very afterthough to me. BTW: Unless its dirt cheap, jeers. These in 4 door format still have no value, and 80K is nowhere near low mileage.

Meh, just hike the prices to make them more 'premium', right? That will move more units.

Just remembered that the later taillights don't fit on the early colonnades... so it must be a '75-'77 body with a early doghouse.

I know... so was Cassini.

The lowest production year for the GTO. Monroe township isn't too far from me... but I'm not there right now. If you like the black '73's, there was an episode of 'Moonshiners' recently (either episode 3 or 4) where Tim puts a new engine in his black colonnade A-bod. Its a red car repainted black, IIRC (you can see the jams aren't done)... and is a hybrid... '73 doghouse, '77 taillights. But its shiny and sounds good when done... so its something of Poncho colonnade eye-candy.

Oddly, I've seen a LOT of Apollos in that relatively odd color. Not with 8K on the odo, though...

I've seen in my rearview at least two people (on different occasions) spin out and hit the center median trying to keep up with me and my yank tanks in inclimate conditions... Whoops.

Oleg Cassini Sonic and a Levi edition Spark.

And party line around here is that the Neon was crap. And the Avenger... and the Sebring... and everything Pontiac ever made... and everything that don't have SatNav... Oh really? Did you post that in 1994 or in 1984? I don't have the production numbers here... but the Sunfire habitually sold more than 100K until the very end. The Grand Am sold between 150K and 250K per year for 20 years. That gives us at least 1 million Sunfires and 4 million Grand Ams. I would guessimate its closer to 1.5 and 5 mill, though. How many cars did Pontiac have to sell to be 'good enough' for 1995? Is the Sunfire the greatest car made?... Hell no. Its noisy, flimsy, made with meh parts and a crash test disaster. Oh, God, it don't have Nav, either. But it was made in coupe and convertible... and the basic shape is MUCH better looking to me that nearly every small car made since. Hell, there is still an aftermarket for it, 7 years after it ended. Again, I'm not specifically attacking the Dart. Its very nice looking for a modern economy car. But let me ask... has ANYONE here driven one? Driven a Giulietta? Driven a Giulietta built by unhappy, union-backed employees in North America somewhere? And what about people who learn its designed by FIAT... a company not exactly synonymous with quality automobiles. In the end, its the entry level Dodge... and in time it will be judged that way even if it gets 200 mpg, goes 300 mph, only emits chocolate ice cream and has seats that feel like sex. So its better to make nothing... or badge then as even cheaper Chevys? There already was a distribution channel for Pontiac... and I'm sure the G8 alone, given a fighting chance, would have added more sales to GM's numbers than Lincoln provides to Ford.

Sure, sure. 1983 C&D Top Ten and MT Car of the Year winner AMC/Renault Alliance. It was talked about all around at the time. Will the Dart win both awards? I'm not saying the Dart is a bad car... it has one of the best taillight treatments in the last decade, even if its copied from the Charger. I am making a comment that you new-car-fanboys have a VERY short attention span and will move on once something more shiny comes along. I made the comment. I stand by it. C&G, Internet Archive and Google have archived it. We've revisit in 4~5 years and 20 years to see how it pans out.