JLR has taken the ballsy decision to not have a low ratio 4WD
Consumer Electronics Show in 2016. Only three rotary knobs that were impossible to remove have been retained and they too have been integrated into the 10.3-inch lower screen of the Touch Pro Duo system so that they look like they are floating.
The result isn’t just clean, it is symphony. Albeit a modern one, where Design has not ditched functionality for form. Instead it has made incredible use of technology to integrate functionality into form. There is a price for all this coolness for it takes time to get used to where everything is and hitting the wrong button on the move happens frequently. Especially when you want to select a different mode on the Land Rover Terrain Response system where the modes on the lower screen are accompanied by an aesthetically lit graphic of the Velar on each terrain. Nonetheless, JLR’s design team has taken the conventional vehicle interior completely on its head and boy, what a difference that has made. It is so cool it would make an utter geek feel like Brad Pitt.
The seeds of these were sown ten years ago, in 2008 when Tata Motors acquired JLR and promptly elevated the status of Design to that of Engineering. Till then, the former reported to the latter. A decade later, the Velar stands out as the result of a perfect partnership between Design and Engineering. Proof that Tata Motors had taken the right decision.
But no Range Rover has been a Range Rover without capability, stunning styling notwithstanding. And the job of ensuring that the Velar wouldn’t be spectacularly toothless was entrusted to JLR’s engineering chief Nick Rogers. Where McGovern and his team worked tirelessly to lend unconventional cool to the Velar, Rogers and his team would have to ensure that the DNA that has always made Range Rovers cool, stayed intact.
True to the Range Rover heritage it comes with all the off-road bells and whistles necessary, including that Terrain Response system and a fancy wade sensor that warns the driver if it detects water above the vehicle’s 600mm wading depth (650mm for vehicles with electronic air suspension). The Velar however is a road going SUV. Therefore, in what is probably also an engineering nod to McGovern’s modernist concept, JLR has taken the ballsy decision to not have a low ratio 4WD in the Velar but use electronics to achieve more or less the same results.