The more we change the more we stay the same.While cars today are cleaner burning we've gained little in saving gas. Modern car are lighter,smaller,engine half the size of old and fuel injected but still get no better mileage then the older ones.I can remember my father having full size cars with V8 engines(69 Impala 327 v8, 72 Plymouth Fury 360 v8). These car gave 22 plus miles per gallon with dads heavy foot.Todays family cars do the same or little more then that. Whats your SUV get. I've owned two Ford Broncos 66 and 72. Both had small V8 and were built like tanks. 18 mpg. I know someone with a Suzuki XL7 4 cylinder. She drives like your grand mother and gets 18 mpg at much less the weight of the old Ford Bronco.So with Car manufacturers spending billions on engineering and tec. what have we gained.Can it be the gas companies putting some green in some ones hand at the cost of our green earth.The environmental laws are a joke. Manufacturers are required to meet certain mileage standards. But this is across the board.They put out a few shoe boxes that get 35 mpg then pump out those Suvs.With the tec we have today we should be seeing 35 or more out of our suvs. Why aren't we.Do as little as we need to and make those profits.Its time car companies are made to toe the line.In the early seventies a 13 year old asked his science teacher after seeing how easy hydrogen was made from water why we don't use hydrogen to power cars.The response was don't be stupid.Here we are 35 years later. 35 years behind in clean burning fuels in our cars.

I am totally and irrationally attached to my old car. We just got a "new" one - a 2008 hyundai santa fe, but I am already thinking about what to get next when we sell this one. We got a killer deal on a low mileage used one and could probably even make money if we sold it today (and would make money if we totaled it). I love having a bigger car with a toddler and I love AWD in bad weather but I do not really love the crappy gas mileage so hoping in a couple of years our options are better for a CUV with better fuel economy (some of the models coming out this year look good so we'll see how good they really are and then look for a good deal in a couple of years). But we just put a lot of money (where a "lot" is relative to the value of the car) our 2001 Honda Accord. NOTHING special about it at all but I just love that car. It needed a new CV joint, 4 new tires, an expensive 100k mile service and new brakes. Somewhat recently it had the timing belt done and a new clutch. It runs like new now and even though it's nothing luxurious or sporty and never was, if I am going somewhere by myself and the weather is OK I will always take the old car. To me it's like that perfectly faded, broken in pair of jeans that are just starting to get good after 10 years. yeah there are a couple of frayed edges but oooh so comfortable. DH wanted to sell it when we got the "new" car and go back down to one car again (we have shared a car for the last 10 years or so that he has been working from home) but it's really much harder to do that with a child... and I just could not bear to give up the old car.

My car's job is to get me from here to there, and back, without a lot of hassle: as long as it does that, it stays. Plus ... without it costing an arm and a leg to do it: I have other important places to use my money. For those of you who like the small ones and have a yearning for a bit sporty and with some get-up-and-go ... ... have you considered Mazda? They have had some performance qualifications, and, lacking the rep of the Hondas, Toyotas, etc., can often be obtained ("used", that is) for a much lower price for the same level of car. Mine is over a quarter my age ... and I'm no spring chicken: it's 24, has cost me some money, lately, and may be about to cost me some more, so I'm wondering how much longer that it may go, with something over 180,000 mi. on its odometer. I'd like to get a standard tranny, as, being scarce and undesirable, they're cheaper - and use something like 6 - 10% less gas than automatics (which is a concern, not only for scarcity of the resource and pocketbook, but environmental reasons). Plus, unless someone is ready to crawl up my tailpipe, I not only shut off the engine and coast to signal lights that just turned yellow ... but am inclined to do it when travelling downhill, as well. As some of you know ... over seven years ago when I was travelling in my little Dodge "Colt" out from my townhouse in town to sleep in uncle's house prior to its sale after his death, to make the place look lived-in, often it was late at night and the road untravelled ... and I found that I could coast for over 16 of the 20 km. going out there (but the return journey was usually during the day, with more traffic, and coasting was much reduced). After the Mazda got hit enough to crookedify a wheel a few years ago, not too long after I got it ... I spent more to repair it than I'd paid ... but it takes a lot of resources to dig ore, smelt and manufacture a new vehicle, along with the petroleum-sourced plastic that they put into them ... ... and repairing requires few scarce resources and fuel/energy, is mostly work-related. ole joyful

Until recently, we drove older vehicles. I had a 95 Chrysler Cirrus (bought in 95) and a 02 Mitsubishi Eclipse Spyder (bought in 05). The Chrysler had 107,000 miles on it when sold to 16 year old as her first car. I traded the Spyder in for a 14 Chrysler 300C. Hubby drove his 99 van until the frame rusted out and we replaced with a 12 Ram 1500 PU. My family has always driven older cars. My brother has my dad's 96 Chrysler Sebring convertible and recently ventured into the 2000s by picking up a 03 Jeep Liberty. He drives multiple cars every day (utility purposes), switching between a work van, his personal 00 Dodge van and a 73 Plymouth Gran Fury. He's got a bout 7 cars (never less; you'd understand if you knew our family). My all time favorite car to drive is now in a museum. A 27 Dodge Cabriolet that was in the family for 30+ years. I loved driving it. The heavy duty truck transmission requiring double clutching, the "grabber" brakes that required an oh so gentle touch on the pedal. I miss that car.....Here's a picture of the car being loaded up to take to the museum. The guy's head that you see is the guy who's in charge of the car. We've kept in touch and they haven't modified the car at all. Still looks like this and is driven very frequently. I've been fortunate to have driven cars from every decade starting with the 1920s and I've enjoyed the heck out of each one.