Driving, a classic or whatever.

[Cadman-iac]

I don't know if this is an acceptable topic for this forum or not,  but is it just me or is society trying to dumb down the skill of driving?
 I know what it takes to drive an old car or truck,  been doin' it for years.  It just amazes me how much "crap" the manufacturers are adding to their new vehicles these days to"assist" the  driver.
 I just watched a commercial on the boob-tube and they showed the driver and passengers just watching the pedestrians along the sidewalk as they were rolling down the street, not paying any attention to where they were going,  and everyone was on their phones. (Like me right now, except I'm not in my car!!).
These vehicles have all the latest garbage that does just about everything but wipe for you. (Given time, who knows.....).
My point being,  people are just passengers,  regardless of where they sit in their car.
 Give me an old car any day.  I love to drive. When I was a kid,  it was a right of passage to get your license.
 Nowadays,  kids don't even know how to drive. My wife's friend's kid is 24 or 25 and has never been behind the wheel.  (That may be a good thing in some cases).
 It's scary to think about driving a classic vehicle in today's traffic with people who have no idea how to control a vehicle anymore, because the vehicle has "sensors" and "controls" and "computers" for everything. You no longer need to worry about lane changing,  or braking,  just get in, turn it on (or tell it to turn on), sit back,  grab your phone,  and enjoy the ride,  right?
 I've driven a classic for my every-day vehicle for years. Its scary to think that someone with a new car could potentially wipe you out when they're technology malfunctions and  they have not a clue what to do. You hear about all these recalls on even 15 and 20 year old cars, let alone the new ones.
 The Jetson age is here!!! Let's go back to the 50's, or even the 60's, where the only thing that's automatic is your transmission.

 Just my opinion.
 Rick

[cadillac ken]

^^ agreed^^

Dumbing down of the driving experience has been going on for some time.  A vast majority of the technological advances in our cars today simply absolve the driver of more and more responsibility in operating their vehicles.  Side air bags, lane correction, speed correction, and automated stopping all send the message that as the driver you can be more and more of an inattentive, irresponsible driver--- Not to worry the manufacturer has your back.
 Not a good thing.

The reality is for many young folks today, driving in not something they should be doing-- nor do they show much interest in it aside from getting from point A to point B.  Which all seems to make a good case for most with this mindset to simply take public transportation.

The cell phone is the bane of our existence when talking about today's drivers.  Take note of how many drivers stop at least 4 or 5 car lengths back from the car ahead of them at a red traffic light as they simply cannot wait to stop driving and to get back on their cell phones.  And then see how often they take a good 5 to 15 seconds to put the phone down and drive when the traffic light turns green. 

Very annoying.  Florida just passed a law that says you can receive a traffic citation for simply being spotted with a cell phone in your hand while driving.  Let's see if they actually enforce it.

[Big Apple Caddy]

It’s long been pretty common for classic car enthusiast to dislike modern cars/features. Your opinions, or similar, are not unique to today and have been held by classic car enthusiasts for ages.

For example, the 1950s era cars you long for were disliked by classic car enthusiasts of that time.  Below are a few quotes from classic car club members in an article ("Fast Growing Club of Ancient Auto Owners Look on New Cars With Disdain") from 1955.

On why there's a growing interest in classic cars....."People's revolt against standardized living, against all cars looking alike, as they do now; it's a return to individuality."

On why club members prefer classic cars over new....."[Modern cars are] too heavy, gross of line; squashy on the curves, tires squeal; don't have the roadability and durability of the classic, don't have the workmanship."

More on why club members prefer classics....."Modern cars are too full of gadgets, too easy to operate.  It's like sitting in a living room and pushing a button.  We like some movement.  We like the gear shift on the gear box, like the feel of shifting the gears, when you get to know your own transmission."


Not everyone agreed with these opinions back then just as not everyone agrees with similar opinions today.  Some people only like new cars, some only like older cars, some like both and some don't like cars at all.  That's the way it's been and probably always will be.

[D.Yaros]

It’s long been pretty common for classic car enthusiast to dislike modern cars/features. Your opinions, or similar, are not unique to today and have been held by classic car enthusiasts for ages.

So, the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Personally, I couldn't agree more with the OP.  And, it is not just cars.  It is food prep, grocery buying; you name it.

We are progressing to a stage where a) there is no need to think and b) those that do are old fashioned and out of it.

Another one that gets me:  I recently read where Chicago is suspending collection of fines for red light violations detected by red light cameras.

The reason?  GET THIS - The majority of violators detected are poor and cannot afford to pay the fines!

So, in this day and age one does not have to bother to think, they also need not have to worry about being responsible for, or bearing the consequences of, their acts?

In the words of Alfred E Neuman, "What, me worry?"

[Anderson]

This verges onto politics, but with the Chicago situation no small part of the problem is that (for reasons out of the city's control) that was cascading into automatic license suspensions and the like.  Remember, the whole "suspend your license for not paying the fine" may incentivize someone with the means to do so to pay...but for someone lacking the means, it either jams them into debt or they just keep driving without a license (and with that lack of a license not actually having to do with their ability to safely drive, else it would have been suspended regardless).  As a further sidebar, I still remember the judge talking about the ability to drive being a "privilege" and being rather not-impressed, not least because of the general state of policy in terms of alternatives. [1][2]


Back to the main topic at hand, however, I think the complaint that I have is that there's no ability to "do without" many of the options.  With many cars, I can't say "Give me a push-button AM/FM stereo with a CD player and to heck with the infotainment system" (with the fun note that with a "normal" stereo I have a good chance of being able to control it while keeping my eyes on the road because of tactile feedback...i.e. "pushing the effing buttons"...that goes away with a touchscreen).  I would compare this to the fact that in the early 1970s, technically you could strip the A/C out of a Cadillac on order (though I gather that only a few people did this, mostly in rather cold climates such as Alaska, Canada, or a few mountain areas where it would be superfluous...but you *could*).

On the other hand, there are a number of safety features I don't begrudge newer cars for (side airbags come to mind), but I don't like things like lane/speed correction (though I won't begrudge cruise control to some extent...if only for a few minutes here and there so I can take my foot off the gas...but I think having a first car where the cruise control started acting up broke me of relying on it[4]).  Dear car: If I am going too fast (or too slow) or moving out of the lane, maybe I have a reason for doing so?  Oh, great, you steered me into a piece of metal on the road and now I have a flat...

I will say that, to some extent, the over-automation is a side-effect of lots of people not having a practical alternative to driving.  It is one thing when you're in New York or Chicago, but the utter lack of workable public transportation (e.g. "the bus runs every hour and the stop is a mile away") and often dubious paratransit in many areas means that there are plenty of people stuck driving who either would rather not be driving or probably shouldn't be driving...but we sure made some questionable decisions in terms of urban architecture and planning in the past.  See [1] below, and understand that in many areas that's only marginally a "corner case".


[1] So, basically there were no buses in my neighborhood.  Nothing else, either.  That left a real disconnect between "this is a privilege" and "the only alternative, if your parents aren't driving/you don't have the money for a driver/driver service[3], is about a one-hour walk to the bus".
[2] The fact that it was an "assistant substitute judge" performing the ceremony sort-of killed the moment, too.  Sorry, when you have a bunch of qualifying titles like that thrown out it suggests that you're really just going through the motions.
[3] A few people did have that, but mostly on the older/disabled side (e.g. there was a restaurant owner who was going blind).
[4] Basically, the CC would randomly start accelerating like a bat out of hell.  It was...exciting...the first time it happened.

[Cadman-iac]

I gotta agree about being able to order, (or not),  what you want on your car.
 At least make the crap so you can turn it off if you want to.  That's how it used to be. If you don't want to use the cruise control,  don't turn the damned thing on.
 I haven't looked at any of the new cars,  and I don't care too either,  (they're fugly as hell to begin with), but has anyone looked to see if it is even possible to turn off that stuff and just drive it like something resembling a car?

[Jay Friedman]

........Let's go back to the 50's, or even the 60's, where the only thing that's automatic is your transmission.

 Just my opinion.
 Rick

We like the gear shift on the gear box, like the feel of shifting the gears, when you get to know your own transmission."

I agree.  I prefer shifting gears and even dislike automatic transmissions.  My '49 Cadillac is stick shift which is fun to drive and I can fix it myself.  I also refuse to buy a modern car with all the gadgetry.  I have a 2009 Toyota Corolla Base with stick shift, roll up windows and key-lock doors.  )It does have all the usual safety features and AC for the Georgia summers.)

Long live cars in which you are the boss rather than the car!

[Lexi]

Cadman-iac (Rick), LMAO. Most of the new cars are indeed ugly. I hate looking at most of them. Got to go shopping for another daily driver as some idiot wrote ours off the other day making an illegal turn. Like Jay & others I prefer just to buy basic transportation, go light on the gadgets and be able to turn stuff off that is not required, (as well as having something that I can also work on easily). At least my old Caddy is relatively easy to work on. Clay/Lexi

[Big Apple Caddy]

So, the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Basically, yes.  Sticking with cars, some of the very years and models of cars admired by classic enthusiast today were disliked by classic enthusiasts decades ago when the cars were brand new, and for the same types of reasons some classic enthusiasts don't like new cars today.  This has been repeated generation after generation.  If some of our forefathers had their way, we might all still be driving Model Ts or perhaps would still be getting around via horse and buggy.  Instead, life moves forward and new eras of cars/transportation come along for the next generation to admire when new and/or as classics in the future and for the previous/older generation to potentially view with disdain.  It's the cycle of life.

[wrench]

It’s amazing that when I started to read the topic that the second paragraph written by Ken resonated.

A lot of young people don’t want to be responsible. They call it ‘adulting’. There are exceptions, I know and I literally thank God for them, because it is a bleak landscape out there as far as finding a young person who isn’t going to spill their latte on their pajamas or their phone screen if they even think about getting off their a**.

I have a million anecdotes about it, but will spare the readership the details.

I drive old stuff and I drive new stuff and while some of the installed safety equipment is a big plus, most of the safety equipment I have is in my head in the form of experience, which is hard to explain to a millennial.

Or an engineer.

Or a corporate executive.

Or...

[Lexi]

Yes, I agree that it is cyclic in nature. I am old enough to have seen that cycle repeat itself. As an example, my father was not particularly fond of my '50s Caddies in the 1970s. "Old" cars to him where box shaped cars from the '30s, or back. While each era seems to have its "signature" general look, (style wise), most of the cars today are very similar in appearance. It will be interesting to see what the future generation will think of 2020 model cars. I suspect that there will always be collectors and hobbyists out there, but my guess is that we will see less of them, and more retro-fitting of cars with new technology to keep them on the road-assuming they have not been legislated out of existence for another technology. Clay/Lexi

[Cadman-iac]

I ve been complaining for years,  since 1984 to be exact, that there should be a comprehensive driving test for everyone, regardless of age.  And it should be given every 5 to maybe 10 years at the maximum.
 In '84 I had a 79 year old woman who had poor eyesight, and a restriction on her license,  turn left in front of me on a rural highway.  I was in a '60 Rambler American,  she in a '79 Cougar.
 I got the worst end of the deal. Car totalled, knees screwed up, back problems.
 Her car was spun around and rolled back into traffic after I t-boned her at 50, the posted speed limit was 55. Some moron repaired her car and she was back on the road in 4 months. I know that because I stopped at a light behind her in the next lane one day. As we pulled away on the green,  she almost sideswiped me.
 I lost my car because she failed to pay her insurance on time, her agent told me since she was in a grace period that I was just out of luck. My lawyer had to sue my own insurance company to get my uninsured to cover my medical bills.
 I was hit head on one day in '09.  A kid came out of a blind side street without looking. I had the plate in my neck pulled loose,  the fusion fractured,  and had to have the plate and screws  replaced. I spent 9 months in a  neck brace.
 So it's not an age issue.  It's a training issue. To compound that, there's more and more people on the road every year, with no kind of formal training whatsoever.
 I can kinda understand where the manufacturers are coming from,  but it's not their problem.  People need to be accountable for themselves.
 I lost my classic Rambler because someone didn't know when to get off the road,  and the government just wanted her money and rubber stamped her right out the door.
 My father in law knew when he was not able to drive safely anymore and he handed me his keys.
 My mother in law on the other hand, kept driving until she had an accident.  We had to take her keys.
 But I see it almost every day.  Too many people with too little skill aiming a 2 ton missile down the road at some poor unsuspecting person,  and it could be you or me in the crosshairs. Its scary.
 
But that's just me. I guess I could be wrong.

 As for most kids these days,  they have no work ethic. Mommy and Daddy gave them everything they wanted,  so why should they work? It's all a game to them.
 And when was the last time someone actually counted your change at a store  instead of just handing it to you in a big wad? Ever watch one try to figure out how much change to give you if you give them an odd amount in order to limit the  coinage you get back. It would be funny if it wasn't so sad.

 But that's just me.  I guess I could be wrong.

[gross707]

And then there are the fast/passing land dawdlers...

[cadillac ken]

I've never bought a new car in my life.  I probably never will.  The newest car I own right now is an '03.  If you think about it guys like us that don't buy new cars are saving a ton of, not only money, but indeed literally a ton of materials in resources--- and yes in the process the environment by not introducing one more newly produced "earth polluter" into the world. Think about it...

[Big Apple Caddy]

A lot of young people don’t want to be responsible. They call it ‘adulting’. There are exceptions, I know and I literally thank God for them, because it is a bleak landscape out there as far as finding a young person who isn’t going to spill their latte on their pajamas or their phone screen if they even think about getting off their a**..

As for most kids these days,  they have no work ethic. Mommy and Daddy gave them everything they wanted,  so why should they work? It's all a game to them.
 And when was the last time someone actually counted your change at a store  instead of just handing it to you in a big wad? Ever watch one try to figure out how much change to give you if you give them an odd amount in order to limit the  coinage you get back. It would be funny if it wasn't so sad.

 But that's just me.  I guess I could be wrong.

Kids today......kids today.....kids today.  The older generations have been complaining about the young generations for decades, centuries even.  For ages, people were saying that kids of the time lacked a work ethic, got too much form their parents, didn't respect authority, lacked discipline, didn't take responsibility, didn't want to be leaders, lacked focus, were lazy, etc.  Ugh.  There's just something about older generations wanting to dump on the next/younger generations.  If the next generations were as bad as the older generations though they were, society would have completely collapsed long ago.

Anyway, isn't this forum supposed to be about Cadillacs??

[Cadman-iac]

Yes, its supposed to be about Cadillacs. I guess my point  on all this was about the chances of losing your classic vehicle or having it damaged by someone who wasn't paying attention, and how today's cars just make the situation worse by allowing them to not pay attention.  Don't worry,  your car will save you!
 I suppose too, what I was asking without actually saying it is,  how many people have had a classic damaged or totalled by someone's careless mistake?

[wrench]

Kids today......kids today.....kids today.

Anyway, isn't this forum supposed to be about Cadillacs??

Lol, I have 5 millennials in my immediate family. I deal with millennials every day. You?

I had to call the fire department back in July as the house across the street was on fire. When all the emergency equipment showed up 3 millennials came out like ‘What’s going on?’ I pointed to the column of smoke billowing out of the house and said ‘Your house is on fire’ ...lol. They had no clue.

So, you want this to be about Cadillacs. Well, in the very near future, the only Cadillacs you will see are going to be in museums and every one of us who has an old car are going to be SOL with a piece of scrap metal that won’t even be melted down because the ‘carbon footprint’ of that activity will be too large, so they will take your car and pile it up somewhere and charge you a fee to do that because of what the topic is describing.

The fact that you don’t see that happening once the plastic autonomous vehicles re owned not by individuals, but by corporations. Millennials want to just summon a robot car using an app and that same vehicle with bring them their food and clothes and Amazon boxes and whatnot ...I know this as I have participated in surveys of young people and how they think and what they want.

Do you actually know what’s going on in the real world of the near future?

Lol, you are in for a big surprise once the boomers are gone.

The purpose of my strident observations here is to inform that the topic is relevant and as you know I am not optimistic about the future of the ‘car hobby’.

New Jersey tried to outlaw old cars over 25 years ago. It was literally a political movement at the time.

Next time there won’t be any opposition.

That’s a fact.

A lot of the comments here talk about historical context, well, that assumes there would be the option to own a vehicle in the future.

That will no longer be an option. So this is a watershed in the automotive industry. Tesla just topped $500 and their capitalization is more than GM and Ford combined and they barely manufacture 300,000 units annually.

Where do you guys think this is heading? You are being ‘social engineered’ and ‘technologically engineered’ out of individual car ownership.

Lol

[Cadman-iac]

Jim,
 We went through a somewhat similar situation in my county here in  Arizona.  About 30 years ago the powers that be felt it was necessary to keep older vehicles out of sight if it wasn't running or being used at the time. It took almost a year to quash the movement.
 I do understand what you are saying.  I see it, even with my own son, who's in his late twenties. It is scary.
 I guess I opened up a touchy topic with this with no unanimous solution in sight.
 I guess  I just wanted a place to gripe.  I apologize to all for that.
 Maybe it just needs to die here.
 Rick

[savemy67]

Hello all,

I'm sure the photo below is a metaphor for something.

The transmission case is from a WWII tank.  Remember the time we won the war?  The '94 Caprice 9C1 (not to scale) is representative of a lot of modern cars:  fuel injection, computer controlled transmission, ABS, etc.

I would argue that from the time of the horse and buggy (both Mr. Studebaker and Mr. Buick were buggy makers) through the late 1960s, the evolution of cars was driven by engineering improvements, many of which were Cadillac innovations.  I would also argue that car buyers had a distinct choice between simplicity (Model T) and engineering evolution (Cadillac), and it was the fact that both choices were available that drove sales.

By the late '60s, and especially after the oil shocks of the early '70s, the evolution of cars was/is driven by government mandate, primarily related to fuel consumption.  And sales are driven by finance, not choice.  How complex and expensive must cars get in order to get the last nth of mileage out of gasoline?

That said, I am not in favor of electric cars as a wholesale replacement for gasoline engine cars.  I do think electric cars could be a successful part of the transportation mix in the future.  But this requires thoughtfulness on the part of you and I and our political system (sigh).

I once had a friend who passed his driver's test while in a coma.  I whole-heartedly agree, that whether you drive a gasoline powered car, or an electric car, you need to be fully engaged in the operation of the car, whether or not it is self-driving.  After speaking with two 737-MAX pilots, I was given a strong positive response to my statement "let the pilots fly the plane".

The future will happen.  Some of us will be gone, and some of us will be there.  All of us can influence it.

Respectfully submitted,

Christopher Winter

[Lexi]

As indicated in my earlier post, I have had concerns for some time about cars in general being legislated out of existence. I won't go as far as Jim's comments on scrap metal, but he is for the most part right. The big obstacle in the future for the internal combustion engine could be as simple as to where to purchase fuel to operate them? Yes, you may have to go to a museum to see old cars at some point in the future. After the expertise to repair as well as a lack of parts (and perhaps legislation) have taken their toll, there will be a lot of parked cars stashed away in garages deteriorating. Much of this will be fueled by the march of technology as well as the "green movement". As my father warned me some 35 years ago, "Beware environmental terrorism". Got lots to say on that, but respecting the rules of the Forum to avoid politics I won't go there. So I am going to enjoy my Cadillac while I still can and live each day like it is my last. Just as we don't see much in the way of horse drawn carriage & buggy cruise nights, most of those items are in museums or owned by few. An example of an earlier technology that was replaced. So guys, get out there and enjoy your Cadillacs. Clay/Lexi