The Colorado House’s passage of HB-1049 [PDF here], a bill requiring restitution for dealers culled during the Chrysler and GM bankruptcies, has drawn a $60,000 “no” campaign from General Motors. The Denver Post reports that GM’s ad campaign, which features lines like “we must keep driving forward to repay our government loans,” and “don’t let special interests stick taxpayers in reverse,” has riled up local lawmakers more than ever, drawing such timeless put-downs as: “they must be spending tax dollars on Botox to say that with a straight face.” The bill would require OEMs compensate culled dealers for signs, parts, dealer upgrades and more, as well as offer them the right of first refusal for any new area dealerships.

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Avondale, Arizona last week decided to terminate its contract with American Traffic Solutions (ATS) for the operation of red light cameras and speed cameras. The city council made its decision primarily on financial grounds after the program failed to deliver on its promise of enhanced safety and substantial profit. With Avondale facing a $3.8 million budget deficit, officials decided the cameras had to go.

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Public and politicians in Japan are not enthused about Toyota’s latest utterings, especially at yesterday’s news conference. “At home, fiercely loyal Japanese drivers are wondering how a firm with a deserved reputation for quality and reliability could allow substandard vehicles to slip through its vaunted quality-control apparatus,” reports the Christian Science Monitor from Toyko. The natives are getting restless … (Read More…)

The Arizona Senate Public Safety and Human Services Committee approved legislation last Wednesday that would substantially expand the size and scope of the photo enforcement program in the state. Lawmakers voted 6-1 to approve legislation allowing the use of automated ticketing machines for a number of new types of violations. Committee Chairman Linda Gray (R-Phoenix) sponsored the legislation after becoming an enthusiastic supporter of cameras.

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With Congress already investigating a possible Toyota unintended acceleration cover-up, the NHTSA has decided that it should probably be getting a piece of the action, and has invoked its statutory power to request documents relating to when Toyota learned of the defects involved in its recent gas pedal recall and how it reacted to them. Federal law requires that manufacturers notify the NHTSA within five days of discovering a safety defect, reports the Wall Street Journal [sub]. The WSJ [sub] also notes that Toyota is offering to disclose new details about its crisis response task force (which reportedly includes “outside quality experts”), as the world’s largest automaker struggles to respond to a rash of recalls that has affected over 8m vehicles worldwide and will cost the company at least $2b. CEO Akio Toyoda will hold his third recall-related press conference in two weeks on Wednesday evening to disclose these details and more on the company’s plans to boost testing and transparency. According to yet another WSJ [sub] report, those measures are said to include less reliance on computer modeling in vehicle design, improved consumer feedback capabilities and more stringent testing of supplier-designed parts.

GM is spending about $100 million a year adding flex-fuel capability to our vehicles. We can’t afford to leave this capital stranded… I think it would be very helpful if we could get government assistance. But I really want the oil industry, I want the people who are at this conference, I want the government and I want us to just work together to make ethanol a reality,

This was the message the GM’s Tom Stephens took to the Renewable Fuels Association’s National Ethanol Conference in Orlando. And though Stephens’ exhortation of the ethanol industry makes for a pleasant addition to GM’s typical ethanol message (i.e. the first sentence of the quote), it’s little more than filler. GM’s push to align itself with the ethanol industry continues unabated, as Stephens reveals that half of all GM vehicles will be flex-fuel capable by 2012. The problem is that GM reckons the country needs another 10k E85 pumps (up from the current 2k), and since the ethanol industry would effectively collapse without government support, nobody from the industry is jumping in to take responsibility for this self-serving infrastructure project.

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We try to cover a lot of the stories in which politics and automobiles intersect, and frankly, most of them are just plain depressing. From biofuel frauds to speed cameras, it seems that motorists as a political class tend to be reactive rather than proactive. Not so in Georgia, where 11Alive reports that a bill is moving through the state legislature that would establish a minimum fine for driving to slow in the passing lane. If there’s a cause that every driver can get behind, this is it. In case you don’t appreciate the depth of annoyance most feel about left-lane bandits, Georgia State Rep. Mark Butler is on hand to explain:

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The Japanese government is getting increasingly worried that the Toyota debacle might turn into a worldwide backlash against Japanese cars, or even all Japanese products. As the world’s 4^th largest export nation, Japan has a lot to worry about.

Today, large parts of the Japanese cabinet came down hard on Toyota, says the Nikkei [sub]. (Read More…)

Photo enforcement machines around the world this week were found to be ticketing drivers who had malfunctioned, ticketed motorists who had done nothing wrong, or the machines themselves were found to be in violation of the law. (Read More…)

A group of nine Missouri lawmakers are looking to expand the use of speed cameras throughout the state. State House members, led by Representative Michael Corcoran (D-St. Ann), on Tuesday introduced House Bill 1947 which appears on its surface to ban the use of speed cameras when, in fact, it authorizes their use.

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LaHood may struggle with some of the technical details (like, you know, how to actually stop unintended acceleration), but he’s got the politics down pat. The gameplan in these kinds of situations is simple: scare the public, shame the automaker, and say lots of things that make it sound like you’re taking charge. Like threatening Toyota with the maximum allowable $16.4m in civil penalty fines [per the Detroit News], potentially shattering the previous recall fine record of $1m set by GM in 2004 for its handling of a windshield wiper recall. The fact that all this makes the government’s “investments” in the auto industry look a little better is just the gravy on top. [UPDATE: Reuters reports that LaHood meant to say that “owners concerned about unintended acceleration should instead seek out dealers for advice and necessary repairs.” You know, instead of implying that all Toyotas are fundamentally dangerous. “What I said in there was a misstatement,” confessed LaHood. [Hat Tip: commenter Fonzy]

A number of states are considering legislation that would outlaw the use of photo enforcement. Last year alone, Maine, Mississippi and Montana added themselves to the list of fifteen states where red light cameras and speed cameras are no longer welcome. On Thursday, the South Dakota House Transportation Committee will consider legislation introduced by state Representative Peggy Gibson (D-Huron) to make her state the sixteenth.

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Supreme court justices in Missouri yesterday openly questioned the constitutionality of the red light camera program in the city of Springfield. The high court heard oral arguments in the case of retired highway patrol officer Adolph Belt, Jr. who attempted to defend himself in a court of law against the automated citation he received in the mail from Lasercraft, a UK-based camera vendor. Springfield insisted that Belt had no such right and that an administrative hearing presided over by a municipal judge constituted the first and last appeal in the matter. This procedure raised eyebrows among members of the high court, as administration represent a function of the executive.

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The UK Sustainable Development Commission yesterday released a report recommending the use of average speed cameras for round-the-clock tracking of motorist journeys nationwide. The government advisory body said that widespread deployment of average speed cameras was required to reduce the emission of carbon dioxide by automobiles, a factor that some believe is linked to global changes in temperature. The report made a number of recommendations affecting the driving public.

“The business models associated with private motoring are not aligned with sustainability,” the report explained.

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The city of Red Bank, Tennessee voted Tuesday to extend its automated ticketing contract with American Traffic Solutions (ATS) for twelve years, in open defiance of the state legislature. Earlier this month, the House Transportation Committee gave its approval to proposed legislation that would place a temporary moratorium on red light camera and speed camera program renewals while a set of engineering and operational standards are developed to ensure statewide uniformity. The committee took great pains to ensure that no city would be deprived of any existing red light camera or photo radar revenue by refusing to ban any existing practices.

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