Tesla car show electrifies crowds
As car shows go, this one was different.
While most weekend gatherings of gearheads draw crowds around muscle cars from Detroit’s Big Three — GM, Ford and Chrysler — there wasn’t a big block in the engine compartments of the upwards of 50 vehicles assembled outside of Reif Estate Winery on the Niagara Parkway.
This was a meeting of the Ontario Tesla Owners Club (OTOC), showing off the best of Elon Musk’s Tesla Motors.
Even the fact that it was raining off and on throughout Saturday didn’t stop owners of all the electric car company’s models — the Roadster, the Model X SUV, the Model S and the most recent and highly coveted Model 3 — from swapping tales about life with their new rides.
“We waited 565 days from putting down a deposit to delivery,” said Mike David of Toronto, who was at the show with his wife, Aisha, and their new baby, a shiny red Model 3. “It’s perfect.”
The feeling was likewise for Majdi AlNabih of Oakville, who took delivery of his Model 3 on June 7.
“It took almost two years and it’s worth every penny,” he said of his red vehicle.
While it has taken more time than expected to get the cars into the hands of buyers, the cars are being snapped up as fast as Tesla can build them, said OTOC president John Dixon.
Ontario drivers may have extra incentive now that the province has come under control of Doug Ford and the Progressive Conservatives.
“Right now, you can get a $14,000 rebate, but the Conservatives will probably end that,” he said. “We’re telling people to get the rebate while they can.”