Buick Envision will be coming to North America
Crossover becomes the first mass-produced, Chinese-built vehicle sold in our market
The single most stunning unveiling at Detroit this year actually took place the night before the show opened to the press.
The Avista was the second gorgeous Buick concept car in a row following last year’s Avenir.
GM wouldn’t confirm the mechanical underpinnings of the car, but given its overall size and proportions — and that they did say it was rearwheel drive and had a 400 horsepower, twin-turbo, V6 engine — you have to assume it’s built on the Alpha architecture also used for Cadillac ATS and CTS, and Chevrolet Camaro.
That’s about as good as bloodlines get these days.
Let’s hope Buick does build it; at the very least, it bodes well for the future of Buick styling.
Buick didn’t formally unveil the Envision — a mid-size, built-in-China crossover which has been very popular in its home country since its release a year or so ago.
But they did confirm that it will come to North America, fitting in between the compact Encore and larger Enclave, which have been instrumental in scoring three consecutive global sales records for GM’s oldest brand.
Envision will also be the first massproduced, Chinese-built car sold in our market — a sure sign of things to come.
As we predicted last week, Chevrolet did announce a hatchback version of the new Cruze sedan. Hatchbacks have generally been anathema to Americans, but small cars such as Ford Focus and Fiesta have done better as hatches than was predicted, and Chevy dealers — even in the States — seem genuinely happy to be getting this car. Maybe the Yanks are finally getting almost as smart as Canadians.
Or maybe they finally have realized that the SUVs and crossovers they love so much are really just hatchbacks on steroids.
The Cruze hatch has the additional advantage of being a particularly handsome and sporty-looking little car.
Chevrolet didn’t actually unveil the production version of the all-electric Bolt in Detroit. That happened a week earlier at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. A bit odd, you might think, given the Bolt will be built in the Detroit area.
But it’s an example of how automotive and electronics technologies are merging. Maybe Apple will reveal the iPhone 8 at the Detroit auto show next year.
In any event, Chevrolet is promising a 320-km range for Bolt. But let’s remember the three types of liars: liars; damned liars; and battery engineers.
Bolt, at least, has the advantage of being good-looking and quite roomy.
Chevy also allows that the car has been specifically tailored to fit into ‘car-sharing’ services such as Lyft (not yet in Canada), in which GM has recently made a substantial investment.
While Chevy did not announce an exact price, they did say it will be under $30,000, after the U.S. federal tax-dollar donation of $7,500 is factored in. So that’s $37,500 (U.S.). Which is way too close to $50,000 Canadian.
Pretty much all government subsidies are bad, because they distort the market. Especially when the money goes to rich people.
There’s no federal handout to Canadian electric car buyers, although Quebec, Ontario and B.C. do line the pockets of people who can consider a car that costs that much. Why isn’t there rioting in the streets over this insane waste of taxpayer dollars?
Again, especially when gasoline is less than a buck a litre? You’d have to drive this thing a long, long way before it started making economic sense. Then you’d probably have to buy a new battery and who knows how much that’s going to cost?
Sorry, folks. Bolt, like all pure electric cars, just does not compute.
GMC offered an all-new Acadia SUV/crossover which differs hugely from the outgoing model by virtue of the fact that it is a whole lot less huge.
Almost 20 cm shorter overall and considerably less bulky, it also has less room, although it is still decently accommodating for five, if a bit snug for seven. Dimensionally, Acadia seems aimed directly at the Honda Pilot, which looks to be its prime compet- itor. Acadia is a substantial 300-plus kg lighter than before and will get significantly better fuel economy.
The all-new C1platform offers large advances in vehicle dynamics. C1will also be used in new Chevy Traverse and Buick Enclave models in the near future.
Acadia’s finely crafted interior would look good in a vehicle costing much more.
GMC has taken dead aim at the upper echelons of each market in which it competes. Its vehicles tend to be sold fully loaded, which increases ‘transaction prices’ — the price at which the vehicle is actually sold — and generates more profits than Chevrolet variants, which utilize the same hardware.
No wonder General Motors loves GMC.