THE centennial Los Angeles Auto Show opens on Friday. It's taken only 100 years to get it right.
In recent years, the show has taken place in January, at or around the same time as Detroit's huge hometown show, which left the L.A. event with the automotive equivalent of Hollywood's dreaded B-list: last year's concept cars, a scattered handful of less-than-earthshaking debuts, and of course the latest Ferrari, Lamborghini and Rolls-Royce aimed at L.A.'s excessive-income demographic.
But this year the show has a new home on the calendar (Dec. 1-10). What a difference a month makes. Now the opening dance of the auto show cotillion, the L.A. show will feature a record 21 world premieres, including seven media-hogging concept cars.
Among them: a Ford Mustang in sleek couture by Italian coachbuilder Giugiaro; VW's small, Golf-based sport wagon, the bound-for-production Tiguan; a blue-sky rendering of a future Acura sedan; and the Suzuki SXbox concept, which integrates an Xbox 360 into the interior console and projects the game display onto the open hood.
If you ever needed a reason to take the bus, here's one: commuters playing "Call of Duty."
With the show's new date comes a new mandate: To make the L.A. show relevant in the politics of the automobile. California is, after all, the state that sued the federal government in 2004 for the power to raise fuel-economy standards in an effort to curb greenhouse gas emissions. In September, the state brought suit against the automakers for damages caused by global warming. California is also part of a coalition of 12 states in a case before the Supreme Court arguing that the EPA's Clean Air Act requires the agency to define carbon-dioxide as a harmful emission and therefore subject to regulation.
The L.A. show represents the automakers' best chance to get their environmental message out to a sympathetic audience. And so BMW is debuting its Hydrogen 7, a 7-series luxury sedan that is a "dual-fuel" vehicle, capable of burning either gasoline or cryogenically stored hydrogen in its V-12 engine. Honda will unveil its third-generation FCX fuel-cell vehicle, a wind-polished sedan with cab-forward design that is a major aesthetic improvement from the stubby lunch boxes that have been on loan to the City of Los Angeles.
And we'll see hybrids galore, including a sportier "Touring" version of the Toyota Prius, as well as a hybrid Nissan Altima and a new hybrid Ford Escape. And from General Motors, hybrid versions of the Saturn Aura, Saturn Vue and even the GMC Yukon 4x4.
