Throwing a New Curve at Small-Car Shoppers
10.07.11
TODAY'S youngsters might be forgiven for assuming that the television was born flat, that music always fit in a digital postage stamp or that economy cars have always been safe, stylish and stuffed.
These innocents have no reference point for the visual and mechanical calamities of yore. Names like Pacer and Escort, Omni and Citation, will be met with blank looks, as will tales of hardier generations sanding away rust or trudging through snow when another tiny junker died in the breakdown lane.
Coming from Hyundai, whose own small cars once seemed as disposable as butane lighters, the redesigned 2012 Elantra shows how thoroughly things have changed. As more Americans embrace small cars as a hedge against fuel prices, automakers are returning the hug with compacts that perform believable impressions of larger, pricier machines.
They're typically a tad slower and their 4-cylinder engines a bit louder; a passenger may suffer the indignity of having to manually adjust a seat. But details aside, these cars have really grown up.
Source: Pittsburgh Post Gazette