Redesigning an icon isn’t easy. The entire MINI lineup gets a full facelift for the 2022 model year. But while the changes appear subtle and, well, not exactly apparent firsthand, there’s a lot more to this update than meets the eye. After all, the MINI Cooper is a design icon. Messing with its face and […]
Last year, early in December, I wrote a column entitled, “If you’re over 80, you should have to take a driver’s test to keep your licence.” You don’t have to do that any more. I explained that seniors organizations had lobbied the Ontario government to stop discriminating on the basis of age and the government […]
In a consumer market that has moved decidedly away from the segment it occupies, the Mazda6 continues to mark the time as a fine example of a vehicle most new car buyers ignore. Only 1,049 Mazda6s were sold in Canada in 2020 that represented a 25 per cent year-over-year decline. It suffered a similar fate […]
Buick has just launched the 2021 Envision compact crossover. An all-new model for the second generation of the nameplate, this one gets a much more car-like nose than before, with broad-shouldered styling front and rear. Inside is also new, though it will still look familiar to Buick buyers. Avenir is added to the model for […]
Kia has been on a roll, of that there is no doubt. In fact, few automakers out there are as poised and responsive to change and customer feedback as the Korean giant is. While they have less of an identity crisis than sister Hyundai, the new Kia K5 neé Optima bears little resemblance to the […]
The two things I wanted to do after finishing engineering school at U of T were race cars, and play in a rock ‘n’ roll band. The two things I swore I’d never do were to teach, or have anything to do with computers. Within six years of graduation, I was racing cars, playing in […]
In the early days, some car companies didn’t have auto-making in their mission statement. Sweden’s Saab was originally an aircraft maker. Of the 16 engineers tasked with designing its first automobile, only one possessed a driver’s licence. France’s Peugeot made coffee grinders to start, then expanded into bicycles. Mazda was a purveyor of cork products […]
The next-gen Buick Envision promises to deliver more style, luxury and technology when it begins to arrive in Canadian dealerships near the end of the first quarter. The compact five-passenger SUV, which originally went on sale in the summer of 2016, is all-new for 2021 and sports a fresh design, a new powertrain and new […]
The announcement sent palpable shockwaves through the Internet: Ford’s all-electric crossover would be called a Mustang Mach-E, and folks all over weren’t having it. And it wasn’t only amongst Mustang diehards; Mustang and EV owner groups alike wondered what Ford was thinking. Well-known as a brutishly entertaining gas-guzzling sports car, how could the iconic Mustang […]
I was nineteen years old. Having had a driver’s license for only two three years, I had already blown the engine in my first car: a 1991 Honda Civic Si. The timing belt had snapped while I was attempting to rev its tiny 1.6-litre engine to redline for the millionth time. This was the early […]