The literal answer is that it’s not the very last vehicle built at NUMMI. A red Corolla had that honor, but this is the very last Tacoma to be built by the UAW. And with that, the grand experiment between GM and Toyota is over. Could anyone have guessed way back in 1984 that the joint venture would eventually fall victim to a GM bankruptcy and Toyota overreach? Perhaps a few, but then who can say  what firm, or even what industry, will be busying NUMMI’s production floors 26 years from now? The times, they are a-changing.

We no longer have the dubious honor of leading this category. We’ve been down that road before, and we know it’s a dead end.

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Edmunds [via Earth Times] has released its monthly “True Cost of Incentives” list, and GM tops the list, followed closely by Chrysler and Ford. Good thing Sergio Marchionne narrowly avoided “getting pulled into an incentive war.” That Chrysler’s sales couldn’t beat last March’s numbers even with these incentives tells you everything you need to know about the state of play in Auburn Hills. Oh, and how is GM’s incentive “leadership” supposed to jive with marketing boss Susan Docherty’s insistence [via the WSJ [sub]] that GM is reigning in its incentives? Who knows. Meanwhile, Ford’s impressive 2010 numbers have to be taken with a grain of salt in light of the Blue Oval’s continuing dependence on spiffs and fleet sales (speaking of which, fleet numbers are up 64 percent at GM, and Ford had a 30 percent-ish fleet mix in March[ via FT]). In fact, Toyota’s much-vaunted move towards incentives seems to not only have helped its sales, it may have also scared Detroit back into some nasty old habits.

Hyundai has announced that its Equus luxury sedan will launch with a “multimedia tablet” (widely speculated to be an Apple iPad) instead of an owners manual. Not only would a tablet be easier to navigate (in theory) than a giant manual, it would also allow owners to schedule maintenance right from the car. Is this the end of the owner’s manual as we know it?

Honda’s sales bounced 22 percent, as the normally incentive-adverse firm broke out financing, cashback and lease deals to keep up with Toyota and GM’s incentive war. Accord and Civic were 23 and 4 percent, with 29,120 and 22,463 units respectively. Odyssey, Pilot and CR-V all broke the 10k mark, with Pilot growing sales the most (48 percent). Fit was down slightly from last March’s recession-fueled sales, managing only 4,670 units. The Insight sold a pathetic 1,652 units.

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Hyundai and KIA combined for an 18 percent sales increase last month, moving 77,524 units between the two brands. Hyundai saw less dramatic increases, up “only” 15.4 percent over last March. Accent (4,233) and Elantra  (8,225) sales were weak compared to last March’s recession fever, but big jumps in Sonata (18,935), Santa Fe (9,548) and Tucson (3,084) volumes kept the momentum going. Sorento (9,156) and Soul (5,106) led KIA’s volume, with Forte (4,830) softening and Optima (3,633) actually gaining. Meanwhile, the fact that other brands were binging on incentives, trying to meet the Koreans on value, means this performance is especially impressive. At least it will be when we have March’s incentive numbers. Full sales numbers after the jump.

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March is shaping up to be the biggest month in car sales since Cash for Clunkers ended, and Ford isn’t being left behind [official release in PDF format here]. The firm’s sales rose 43 percent last month, matching February’s performance and setting another record for sales since 1984. Ford brand sales led the way with a 45.6 percent increase, while Lincoln climbed 18.9 percent and Mercury rose 26.2 percent. Focus hit 19,500 units, a 57.5 percent increase, while Fusion sales grew 79 percent to 22,773 units, an all-time record for the nameplate. Escape flirted with the 20k mark as well at 19,182, while F-Series hit 42,514, a 30 percent increase. Explorer even saw a 78 percent bump to 5,907, and a 53 percent bump in fleet sales sent over 10,000 Econolines out the door. Lincoln sold 450 more MKZs than it did last March, otherwise only the Town Car and Navigator were up (modestly). Milan carried the Mercury brand, up 71 percent to 3,897 units. Grand Marquis and Mariner sold 3,532 and 2,482 respectively. Though Ford had a great month sales-wise, its luxury brand situation continues to be one hot, steaming mess.

With the industry locked in the first incentive war of 2010, analysts have been predicting big sales numbers for March (especially in comparison with March 2009’s weak sales), and GM did not disappoint [sales spreadsheet available here in XLS format]. The General got big numbers out of its newest models [press release here], with the Buick LaCross selling over 6k units, the Cadillac SRX topping 4k, Camaro coming up just shy of 9k units and Equinox moving 12,805. By brand, Buick improved its sales by nearly 76 percent over February 2009, Cadillac bucked its underperformance, ending up 41.8 percent, Chevy added 40 percent and GMC was up 45 percent.

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Hyundai’s Sonata would be a quantum leap forward for the Korean firm under any circumstances, but with a direct-injected standard model, a new hybrid model and now a twin-scroll turbocharged model, it also offers three of the hottest technologies in the business today. The turbo version makes 274 hp, 269 lb-ft of torque while still achieving an estimated 22/34 mpg, making it a V6-free performance option in the crowded midsized segment. Too bad it won’t be available with a manual transmission.

Way back when the Chevy Volt was taking center stage in GM’s case for bailout (as in give us one, or you won’t get the Volt), the Obama Administration’s task force on autos was not amused. “While the Volt holds promise, it is currently projected to be much more expensive than its gasoline-fueled peers and will likely need substantial reductions in manufacturing cost in order to become commercially viable,” was just one of the knocks the pols gave the then-mule-stage Volt. And even though the Nissan Leaf has since proven that the Volt is also “much more expensive than its pure-electric peers” the White House’s official car guys have changed their tune.

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Hyundai’s just-unveiled Sonata Hybrid is the latest step in the Korean brand’s assault on the American automotive landscape, and it looks to have been a good one. No licensed bits from Toyota here, in fact Hyundai’s new powertrain does away with Toyota’s powersplit-CVT concept, simply replacing the torque converter on its automatic transmission with a starter-generator motor and a high-efficiency oil pump. Ok, maybe not simply.
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In a number of municipalities, decreases in tax receipts seem to be followed by an increase in traffic tickets according to USA Today [Hat Tip: ClutchCarGo]. Surprised? Clearly you don’t read much of our coverage of the proliferation of speed cameras. It’s no surprise that cities turn to speed cameras to shore up budget gaps, as the companies that sell automated ticketing machines regularly highlight the revenue upsides of their products to politicians. But what about “the cushion,” the five to ten mile per hour grace given by gentlemanly police officers to motorists just barely over the speed limit?

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Due to the poor planning of yours truly, TTAC won’t have its own New York Auto Show photography until a bit later in the week. But then, it’s also beginning to look like Toyota won’t have a real sports coupe worth mentioning until the FT-86 comes out sometime around 2012. Hey, nobody’s perfect. Meanwhile, let’s try to enjoy what we do have: press shots of a warmed-over, front-drive cute-coupe. Scion swears the tC’s 2.5 liter engine and platform (McPherson front/Double Wishbone rear) are “all new,” but it’s not enough to make you forget that a $25k, RWD, boxer-engined “true” sports coupe is coming from Toyota in a few short years. Which is good for patient enthusiasts, but not so great for the Scion brand.

An RL Polk study, reported in the Detroit Free Press, reveals that Americans scrapped 1.2m more vehicles than they bought in the 15 months ending in September 2009. 14.8m vehicles were scrapped in that time period, compared to 13.6 new registrations, suggesting that new car sales could be heading towards an upswing. And with an average fleet age of 10.2 years (the highest in 14 years), common sense seems to indicate that the rebound should happen soon. Polk VP Lonnie Miller explains:

It foreshadows what may be pentup demand. The assumption is that those vehicles have to be replaced.

But is it that simple? Even Miller admits that a number of factors might cause scrappage to exceed new registration for the immediate future.

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We recently asked our Best and Brightest to show us their favorite car ads of all time, and we all wasted the rest of the day staring at old Youtube clips of some of the best auto spots of all time. But what was the best car ad to come out in 2009? According to Automotive News [sub], Nielsen IAG Automotive has awarded this Kia Soul ad the prize of “Automotive Ad of the Year for effectiveness” for 2009. But was it really the best? Be sure to include your own nominations for the best car ad of ’09 in your comments.