Updates: Where Have You Been?

Houston Auto Show

I did have the opportunity to catch the 2019 Houston Auto Show. Full disclosure: Chevy gave me tickets to catch the show and felt it would be a missed opportunity not to go. I was actually hoping to see some new concept cars and the well covered Toyota Supra. This was not necessarily the right venue for that or the manufacturers felt it wasn’t worth their time and effort, except Land Rover/Jaguar; more on that later.

Ford’s lineup was what I expected; the death of their car lineup in the US.

Lincoln on the other hand: wow. The Continental interior is boss. The exterior is a retro-clean design… Guess what? There will be a special edition with suicide doors. Bonus: not as nearly expensive as other luxury vehicles.

Now, GM is still making cars (at the moment) and one of them that caught my eye was the Buick Regal TourX. Normally, there’s nothing that would appeal to me in that brand. This re-branded Opel/Vauxhall/Holden is impressive for a ‘Murican wagon.

Forgot to take a pic… So here’s a stock photo. Possibly the alternative to the Subaru Outback and Volvo V70

One of the sales rep on the floor mentioned that the CTS-V will no longer have a manual gearbox in part due to its owner demographics not being able to control the vehicle. Other words: our customers were either destroying the tranny or wrapping the powerful car around an innocent light pole. The only option now is the ATS-V with its RWD twin-turbo V6 outputting 445ft-lbs of torque. HP stats doesn’t matter after that… It’s fast for most people and its around 80K with what’s in the picture.

She is gorgeous… And last of the manual transmissions in a Caddy

GM display a few of their other cars like the Chevy Bolt, Volt, and Sonic along with the huge selection of trucks and SUVs. I guess it was a marketing decision to downplay the smaller vehicles and EVs. Who knows…

FCA had their respective lineup, with Jeep having a large roller-coaster-like driving experience indoors.

Hyundai, Kia, Nissan, BMW, Mercedes, Toyota, Honda, and so on were there as well. As mentioned earlier, nothing new or exciting was on display.

There were some custom and classic cars on display in the convention center. Never thought I would see a Nissan Pao here though.