The European Union (EU) wants to cut the number of pedestrian fatalities caused by cars in half by 2010; Auto Industry reports some 8k Eurozone pedestrians and cyclists are killed by vehicles each year. The EU is proposing that all new cars be equipped with Brake Assist Systems (BAS). (Brake Assist systems monitor how fast the brake pedal is being depressed and when panic stops are detected; the system automatically applies maximum boost.) The EU figures “if the complete European car fleet is fitted with BAS, as many as 1,100 pedestrian lives may be saved every year.” According to EU Commission Vice-President Günter Verheugen, the new regulation would replace 27 national laws and two EU directives. It’s all spelled out (in language only a bureaucrat could love) in an EU white paper poetically entitled Directive 2003/102/EC.

Back when Honda was looking to launch their hybrid Accord in the US, the marketing mavens noticed that the gas – electric version was the fastest arrow in the company's quiver. They proposed pitching the gas – electric Accord as a green hot rod (skinny tires and all). Honda's top brass KO'ed the idea for failing the "if it's fun, it can't be good for you" PC test. The hybrid Accord went on to sell… very poorly. So it's no surprise that the AP (via the Detroit News) reports that Honda's showing-up at the Tokyo Motor show with a hybrid sports car concept. The CR-Z not only steals a letter from Nissan and displays a taffy pull version of Volvo's corporate nose cone, it also boasts "the essence of the sports car." The man behind the design-speak, Honda engineer Tetsuji Morikawa, says Honda will sell the CR-Z "in the near future" (about the time the Chevy Volt appears, presumably). The AP reporter clearly hasn't driven the hybrid Accord; he suggests that hybrids ain't got no torque and their greasy bits preclude pistonhead packaging. "The CR-Z comes with a new hybrid system developed by Honda whose breakthroughs allowed designers to get around such restrictions." Never mind the dressed-to-impress sheetmetal, we want to know about those breakthroughs…

Last January, Ford canceled plans to invest as much as $1b in factories in Thailand. FoMoCo reckoned it couldn't make their money pay off given the currency controls imposed by Thailand's new military-backed government. Bloomberg reports they've reconsidered. The Blue Oval Boyz will team-up with Mazda and shell-out $500m (each) to set-up a joint factory (so to speak) in the former Siamese Kingdom. Ford and Mazda already have shared facilities in China and a pickup truck factory in Thailand. The new venture is looking to export the Mazda2 and/or other products to other countries in the region: Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. They'd better; Ford says the Thai plant will be able to crank-out 275k units per year. 

Safe Speed is one of our favorite monomaniacal websites, dedicated as it is to fighting the good fight against the UK's superabundance of speed cameras. Saying that, crusader/publisher Paul Smith takes semi-regular excursions off-topic to address wider road safety issues. PR546 (but who's counting?) criticizes The Highway Code for ballooning to 133 pages, as the weightier tome causes "essential safety messages to get lost." In its stead, Smith proposes a 100-word code, as follows: "Drive on the left. Make sure you can see and be seen. Keep a constant look out all around. Be aware of signs and regulations and why they are there. Be predictable. Recognise and anticipate danger and keep clear space from it. Always ensure that you can stop within the distance that you know is clear. Develop your skills. Give courtesy, co-operation and space to others. Don't obstruct them. Never take risks, drive unfit or compete with others. Safety is paramount and far more important than priority. Take personal responsibility for your safety and the safety of those nearby. Enjoy."

The South African term [of endearment] for a pickup truck is a "bakkie." Right. So. While the world waits and wonders about the potential impact of a flood of Chinese-made cars on the international auto scene, iAfrica reports that cheap Chinese pickups are pouring into the South African market, driving down prices of two to three-year-old Japanese bakkies. While owner-drivers are still opting for "quality," the fleet market is one with the Chinese pickups' "cheap as chips" appeal. Brand Pretorius, chairman of McCarthy Motor Holdings, says he's not worried that Chinese cars will have a similar effect on the passenger vehicle market. With freight costs and a 30 percent import tariff, Chinese automakers fight an uphill battle against locally made product with export credits (e.g. the Chevrolet Spark). "It will be tough for Chinese manufacturers to undercut the current entry-level small cars by a significant margin, so the impact won't be as severe."  

American pistonheads, tree-huggers and pistonhead tree-huggers have been clamoring for Euro-diesels long before California passed regulations making them legally untenable. WardsAuto reports that The Boffins of Bavaria will add a urea-injection system to their 3.0-liter variable twin-turbo diesel and bring that bad boy stateside. In the Eurozone, Bimmer's six cylinder oil burner cranks-out 286 hp and stumps-up 427 lb-ft. of torque– which, it must be said, is one Hell of a lot of torque. (Satch Carlson, editor of Roundel, the official magazine of the BMW Car Club of America: "It feels and sounds something like a big-block Chevy when you put your foot down.") The not-smelly, non-clattering 3.0-liter inline six currently serves duty in BMW's European 335d, 535d and 635d models. There's no word on which US models will be blessed with the oil burner, or what they'll cost stateside. 

Thinking about buying that midlife crisis Boxster? Better get on with it. Citing the dollar's weakness against the euro, the Wall Street Journal predicts that the price of cars imported from the Eurozone will rise over the next year. So far, European automakers have been able to hold the line on price using currency hedging, which "lock in" exchange rates. Unfortunately for German car lovers, the contracts are due to expire. BMW and Mercedes will probably continue to rely on their US-built products to fill the profit gap, and hope the situation reverses itself. VW says they're fully hedged for 2007 and "more or less fully hedged for 2008." After that, it's anyone's guess what they'll do: build factories in the US, turn to China for production and/or raise prices. Porsche? Audi? Price hikes. Jaguar? The sooner it's someone else's problem, the better Ford's gonna feel. 

CARkeys reports that French automaker Citroen has taken the wraps off a “carbon drawing down” cash-back offer. Under the terms of “GO LO CO2,” UK motorists who purchase a new Citroen with a lower CO2 emissions rating than their current ride receive £500 discounts on Citroen’s C-series of mini cars and the Berlingo Multispace MPV, or £1000 cash back Xsara Picasso compact MPV. You might consider this a cynical ploy capitalizing on political correctness to move moribund metal, but we couldn’t possibly comment. Meanwhile, despite having the lowest CO2 average of any European automaker, The Wall Street Journal reports that PSA Peugeot-Citroëns registrations in France were virtually flat in September, up just .4% over the first nine months of the year.   

From the land of sleeping policemen and speed cameras, gizmag brings news that will touch the inner hoon in all of us. Londoner Tim Brady is now the new British national automobile speeding ticket record holder. Brady broke the old record by 16mph, by doing 172mph (277kph) in a 3.6 liter Porsche 911 Turbo "borrowed" from his employer, a luxury car rental company. After the police clocked him, it took Brady almost 2300 ft (700 meters) to stop. Brady is now serving a 10-week jail sentence and lost his license for his actions. By the way, he still didn't beat the record for the top speed ever recorded on a British roadway. That belongs to motorcyclist Daniel Nicks who registered 175mph (282kph) on a Honda Fireblade. But the Brits still have a way to go to beat the Yanks– American Samuel Armstrong still holds the world speeding ticket record by doing 205mph (330kph) on a Honda RC51 superbike.

India’s economy is growing fast. Too fast. To curb inflation, the country’s central bank has been busy raising interest rates. Bloomburg.com reports the result at the auto industry’s sharp end: new car loans are the most expensive they’ve been in five years. As nearly 75 percent of all of India’s fresh whips are purchased on credit, the new car market has slumped since June. Most Indian automakers are reacting to the credit crunch by trimming production or holding off on new factories. With plans for three new plants in the next 18 months, Tata managing director Ravi Kant has decided to offer new customers deep discounts to move the metal. If and how this will effect the Indian automaker’s bid for Ford’s damaged Jaguar brand is uncertain, but it can’t help.

Auto Motor und Sport (via Just-auto [sub]) reports that Toyota is withdrawing the Land Cruiser from their Eurozone dealerships after this model year. The move comes as ToMoCo seeks to trim its entire fleet's CO2 averages to 140g per kilometer, as per voluntary European Union (EU) regulations. As the heavyweight SUV wasn't exactly a stellar seller and a new, more environmentally friendly Land Crusher Cruiser is about to debut, it's no biggie. More interestingly, Toyota plans to increase the price of their hot-selling, recently redesigned RAV4 in order to curtail demand– and meet the CO2 target. The changes to Toyota's lineup illustrate the difficulty faced by smaller manufacturers like Porsche, who don't sell low CO2 machines that "average out" their gas guzzlers' emissions. Hence German manufacturers' campaign to get the EU to set CO2 limits based on vehicle size, rather than fleet averages. Just-auto figures that idea's a non-starter. Next question: can a brand under a corporate umbrella (i.e. Volkswagen's Bugatti) rely on the meta-group's high mileage cars to meet the regs? And even if they can, will the detrimental effect on the larger brand encourage the corporate mothership to jettison the CO2-spewing boutique brands?

Is there an ICLU (as opposed to the ACLU)? If so, they may want to have a word with the Indian government re: their plans to require automotive manufacturers to equip all new cars with radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags. The Economic Times reports the Ministry of Heavy Industries' rationale: "violations by motorists could be tracked and all violations identified." But it's RFID-enabled tolls that's really got the Powers That Be all excited. Clearly, India is not unaware of the potential revenue possibilities environmental benefits of an RFID-based congestion charges. The article cites Connaught Place in Delhi, MG Road in Bangalore and Colaba and Andheri in Mumbai as the most toll-deserving of traffic hot spots. In fact, "the Delhi government is planning to substantially increase the parking fee and entrance charge in such core areas to convert them into traffic-free zones." Traffic-free? Wow, that's harsh.  

On the same day that the United Auto Workers (UAW) decided to strike GM, the automaker has announced it's ramping-up its US to China exports by $800m. The Economic Times reports that Shanghai GM (GM's joint venture with China's SAIC Group) will import the Buick Enclave CUV for China's 400 Buick dealers. As concerns about Chinese outsourcing form no small part of the UAW's beef with The General, the timing of the announcement can be seen as a carrot or a palliative for union reps and members who consider job security Job One. Of course, the strike obviates Enclave export for the foreseeable future, and the union is keenly aware that GM imports billions of dollars worth of Chinese parts for their North American products, with the threat of fully-assembled cars from The Peoples Republic replacing NorAm products. Still, nice try.

Over the last two days, there's been a definite upswell in UK government policies and plans that seem specifically designed to make UK motorists as miserable as possible. Yesterday, Pistonheads (birthplace of TTAC) reported that Nottingham City Council is planning a £350 annual tax on workplace parking spaces to force commuters to abandon their cars for public transportation. Subtext: Nottingham doesn't have the political or financial capital (or money) to create a London-style Congestion Charge; a parking spot tax is the next best thing. Eight other UK councils are considering the same idea. Also yesterday, Pistonheads revealed that the UK's Director of Public Prosecutions Ken McDonald said all UK drivers caught violating the ban on using a cell phone while driving should be charged with dangerous driving, which inflicts a driving ban and a maximum two year jail sentence upon convicted license holders. And today, Pistonheads says the Department for Transport and the satnav company Trafficmaster are secretly testing a system to monitor drivers' movements, as a possible prelude to a national, pay-as-you-go road pricing scheme and/or a method for speed enforcement. Can it get any worse for the UK's beleaguered motorists? Yes it will.

Nigeria's automotive industry is facing extinction. After the demise of Steyr and Volkswagen Nigeria Limited, about all that's left is the Peugeot Automobile Nigeria Limited (PAN). Starting with three shifts producing 240 cars per day, PAN now has only one shift producing 22 cars per day. AllAfrica.com places the blame on a number of factors: prices beyond the reach of most Nigerians, high production costs, "inadequate patronage of locally-assembled automobiles" and substandard performance by suppliers. PAN's chairman Alhaji Sani Dauda contacted Nigerian president Umaru Yar'Adua asking the government for help. The president "assured them that he would intervene in the sector, stressing that the automobile industry the world over enjoys the support of government." Nigerian auto industry experts feel unless the government steps in, "the nation's automobile industry would lapse into oblivion with all its attendant implications" such as layoffs of thousands of workers, and "the country's automobile market risks being consigned to the whims and caprices of non-Nigerian vehicle importers." They want the government to take several actions, including lowering the customs duties on knocked down vehicles intended for assembly in the country to one percent while raising the duties on completely assembled cars to fifty percent. Good luck with that.