A day at the 2016 NYIAS

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I’ve been going to the New York International Auto Show on-and-off for the the last ten years. Of those 10, some were better than others; this year fell right in the middle. The automakers brought some really exciting vehicles, but many more were just background scenery.
That said, I went to this year’s NYIAS and snapped photos of anything and everything that caught my eye or that I thought would be of interest here. A quick disclaimer: I’m by no means an expert photographer, and mediocre may even be a stretch. Without further ado, come with me as we take a look at what New York’s premiere new car show had to offer…

For simplicity’s sake I’m going to go through this in the order of which I saw or came across everything…
Ye be warned: all pictures are unedited.
The day started out with a line. A long line. All I can say is that the forecast called for rain and the rain held out, so it could have been worse.
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When I finally got inside, the fun began. And by “fun” I mean absolute masses of people. It was the most crowded I’ve ever seen. Anyways…
Say what you will, the T/As do look good. Sure, a questionable way to spend money on top of a 5th gen Camaro, but I’ve always liked how they look.
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Then I got to “see” the new Ford GT…
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But finally it cleared out and I was able to snag a few pictures of Ford’s new supercar.

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They had a GT at the show last year but repainted it yellow (or maybe brought a different one) for this year’s show. It was a crowd favorite.

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Ford brought a whole slew of their other performance cars as well

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Meanwhile, Nissan brought a camouflaged GT-R, and the revised version as well. It was likely due to the lighting, but new GT-R made for what were my best photos of the day.

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The mouth on the new 2017 ZL1 is so huge that it looks like it could inhale the better half of a Sonic. The rest of the car looks good, though I did sit in an RS and was shocked by how poor the visibility was. The roofline comes down in what is being referred to as a helmet-like design and, in conjunction with a gauge pod that stands way too tall, it seriously hinders how much you can see in front of you.
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VW’s booth was pretty small this year, relative to the automaker’s size. Wonder if they’re using some of their display money on lawyers…
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Flat white Viper ACR is something I didn’t know I want but now I certainly do. What a car…
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It’s really too bad there isn’t going to be a Dart SRT-4, because it would have been a riot with 300ish HP and AWD. This one looked decent, and I can only imagine would look better with fender flares.
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Something about the Tiguan GTE reminds me of the original BMW X5. It could be the size or one of the proportions, but there’s a resemblance there, especially in the rear 3/4 angle.

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The Alltrack looks exactly as you would expect, but it’s too bad there isn’t an R or TDI version…

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The Corvettes were understandably swarmed…
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Kia’s Telluride concept is a good looking SUV, reminiscent of Land Cruisers and the likes of the off-road capable SUVs of yore
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Buick’s new Cascada is actually quite attractive
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Buick supposedly won’t be building the Avista, but that won’t stop me from hoping they do

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Jury is still out for me on the Miata RF. I love the idea of a targa roof, but I’m not sold on its application here…really need to see it in another color, or in a modified guise, to pass final judgment.

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The Porsche booth was packed

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Bradley Brownell’s favorite new car, the 911 R!  (Sorry Brad, couldn’t pass up another opportunity to troll; I’m done now).

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Boxster 718 looks quite good

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Cayman GT4, natural drool-inducer
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Porsche, never missing an opportunity to advertise their non-car products
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The new Volvo cars are striking, especially the XC90 in this gorgeous blue
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The front of the new S90 is fantastic…the back end, not so much

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Toyota has successfully made the FR-S worse looking by turning it into the 86…

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The Genesis concept  should definitely go into production as-is
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After sitting in the ATS-V, it’s definitely made my Dream Car list. Hopefully it depreciates like the previous-gen CTS-V has…

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The Bentayga is pretty hideous

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Jag’s F-Type SVR is a stunner, though not all that much different looking from a “regular” Coupe R

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Infiniti’s new Q60 is really nice looking, with the appropriate creases and curves to make it evolutionary from the G cars but still easily identifiable as an Infiniti coupe.

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I wasn’t a huge fan of the Continental last year, but it’s grown on me. Would be better with suicide doors though.

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The Lexus LC somehow looks more tame in person than it did in the press photos, but it’s still an extreme design. Definitely eye-catching, but I’m not sure about the wheels…
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I’m not sold on the new Ridgeline. There’s something wrong with the styling and I can’t quite put my finger on it, but I’m not liking it the way I’d hoped.
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I then wandered outside to check out Jeep’s off-road capability demonstration, something they’ve been doing for years.  It’s a big attraction for people who have never gone off-road or who are interested in the Jeep vehicles, but in reality it’s a marketing gimmick (being an off-road guy I can also see straight through what they display as “challenging”).  Interestingly, a heavy downpour deemed the Cherokee Trailhawk in these pictures incapable of climbing the first obstacle of the course, and in turn they briefly stopped ride-alongs.  The driver didn’t seem to have a perfect grasp of what he was doing…a bit of throttle at the wrong time sent the tires hopping, and he backed down the steps after one shot.  Maybe the director told them to not take any chances, but it was definitely something a Jeep, especially one with a Trailhawk badge, should have been capable of.

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Not quite sure I get this ad…?

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The new Lexus RX is pretty…polarizing. As is the GLE. Not necessarily in a good way.

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This Z was very, very clean and made me want to drive it very, very hard

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Elio Motors made an appearance with a small booth, though I dared not enter

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I was severely disappointed by Jeep this year. The company commonly uses the NYIAS to do its big-scale unveilings and reveals and this year they graced us with…the Grand Cherokee Trailhawk.  All the talk of the next-gen. JL Wrangler, a Wrangler-based pickup, and the Grand Cherokee Trackhawk/Hellcat, and the only thing they roll out is a slightly modified version of the Grand.  Not only that, but they’re still pushing the Compass and Patriot…c’mon…

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The new Raptor is menacing, but almost too big for its own good.

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Subaru’s new Impreza is fairly monotonous in person. It looks just like the current car, and like many other small sedans and hatchbacks as well. We can only hope they go big with the WRX/STI and give us huge flares, gold wheels, and a version built on the hatch body.

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The Fiat 124 made an appearance, in all its Italian -Miata glory. There’s something about it that definitely looks a bit Dodge, maybe reminiscent of the Demon concept? Either way, it’s a good looking car that I need to drive as soon as I can get my hands on one. The non-Abarth version does look a bit soft, though maybe it was the color scheme of the car they had present.

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Something didn’t feel right about the Mitsubishi booth, and it wasn’t until I figured out there was no Evo present that it made sense. The booth as a whole as fairly empty, with nothing for the enthusiasts to swoon over. The PHEV Outlander isn’t a bad looking vehicle but the Rally version they had looked great. Sell that one, Mitsu!

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Finally, there was the Scion booth. It was a bit somber walking through and looking at their concepts, old and new(ish), and realizing there wouldn’t be any more from the quirky Japanese manufacturer. It’s always sad to see an auto brand die and with Scion it’s no exception, though definitely less so than when we lost companies like Saab or Pontiac. This was the last time I’ll walk through a Scion booth, so farewell to the brand, and here’s to hoping another pops up to take its place.

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  1. mdharrell Avatar

    As I suspected, an 1800 is still head and shoulders above anything made in Sweden today.
    http://i2.wp.com/hooniverse.info/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/DSC_0228.jpg

    1. BЯдΖǐL-ЯЄРΘЯΤЄЯ Avatar
      BЯдΖǐL-ЯЄРΘЯΤЄЯ

      Yes, I thought I was the only one interested more by the P1800 than the new cars.

    2. Ross Ballot Avatar
      Ross Ballot

      Unfortunately it was pretty tough to get a good look at it, but it did make for a good photo

    3. smokyburnout Avatar
      smokyburnout

      they brought two!

      1. Sjalabais Avatar
        Sjalabais

        I love that they did that…but…there’s no relationship whatsoever, right? It’s a bit like Tesla having a Camaro tower over their booth – because they’re both American?

        1. smokyburnout Avatar
          smokyburnout

          oh, no, it’s in Volvo’s booth, which just happened to be really tall and next to superluxurycar row

      2. mdharrell Avatar

        So Volvo is “honoring” its past by mislabeling an 1800E as a P1800. That’s not terribly reassuring.

        1. dead_elvis, inc. Avatar
          dead_elvis, inc.

          Maybe they’re tired of correcting people, so hey, screw it.

          1. mdharrell Avatar

            As an educator I sympathize but am still disappointed.

          2. dead_elvis, inc. Avatar
            dead_elvis, inc.

            As a pedant, I share your disappointment.

  2. Citric Avatar
    Citric

    From that angle it appears as though the Bentley suv thing took the mantle of “car that looks most like a cat going through a hole slightly smaller than its head” from the departed last generation Chevy Spark.

  3. Muthalovin Avatar
    Muthalovin

    NSX!!

    1. mdharrell Avatar

      Which one?

      1. Ross Ballot Avatar
        Ross Ballot

        Race car!

  4. jim Avatar
    jim

    “Not quite sure I get this ad…?”
    The dog is a german shepherd.

    1. Ross Ballot Avatar
      Ross Ballot

      Ah ha! Thank you! Clearly I couldn’t connect the dots

  5. CraigSu Avatar
    CraigSu

    The white Z can be seen and heard on a recent episode of Jay Leno’s Garage.

  6. Sjalabais Avatar
    Sjalabais

    The ZL1 is a bit strange. The whale mouth grille is pretty open, but what one can see through it…meh. There should be polished steel pipes and smoking, moving parts instead. Also: “Helmet design cabin” is not new, but the other car I associate with these words is off the cool scale compare to the little Government Motors:
    http://images.thetruthaboutcars.com/2011/12/saab-900.jpg
    How close to the market is the Kia Telluride? I always see Volvo’s new XC90 in the profile. Both that one and the Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV are very popular in Norway (even though the Volvo starts at around 120000$ here), but Mitsubishi’s tend not to hold their value well.
    The Jeep Trailhawk has a peculiar underbite, probably to get good grading levels?:
    http://i2.wp.com/hooniverse.info/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/DSC_0463.jpg
    Fairly embarrassing that it didn’t manage a set up course…

    1. JayP Avatar
      JayP

      I’m going to give the Compass a few years to crash the used car market. I’ll look to pick one up on the cheep as winter beater. It can’t be crap all year, can it?

      1. Ross Ballot Avatar
        Ross Ballot

        Wonder how long it’ll take for the Compass/Patriot to meet LeMons levels of cheap…

        1. Maymar Avatar
          Maymar

          http://www.autotrader.ca/a/Jeep/Compass/Mississauga/Ontario/5_27000308_20141223141000914/?showcpo=ShowCPO&orup=1_15_9
          Here’s a 250k mile Compass for the equivalent of $2200, so soon. Very soon. Calibers can be had for half that.

          1. Sjalabais Avatar
            Sjalabais

            That’s just eight years old…what a bad investment!

          2. Maymar Avatar
            Maymar

            Eh, around here, anything North of 300k kms is exceptionally rare except for working vehicles and the odd Jetta TDI (most people give up on their car once it needs a repair for more than it’s worth, so it doesn’t get the chance to accumulate mileage). That’s about on par with whatever else is out there of similar age and mileage.

          3. Sjalabais Avatar
            Sjalabais

            Interesting – that doesn’t apply for Norway. Divide by roughly 6 to get Canadian dollars:
            http://m.finn.no/car/used/search.html?make=0.776&mileage_from=300000&sort=3
            People here are not really afraid of high mileage cars; maybe too little so. I’ve seen “facebook connections” buy Mistubishis past the magical 200k kms marker and then they are surprised that transmissions go legs up etc.

          4. Maymar Avatar
            Maymar

            Even here, Jeeps hold their value to an extent, but not that badly (at least at the high end). I think there’s enough people willing to take a chance on a high km Jeep with the 4.0 or 5.2, because they’ve both got reputations for longevity, and it’s something with an increasingly finite supply.
            I’d also assume in your case, with Jeeps starting at quite a bit more (if I’m not mistaken, a new Grand Cherokee that’d cost about $60k here would be the equivalent of $155k for you?), it also keeps used prices high? For perspective, the Compass would be a $20-25k car new here, for most people.

          5. Sjalabais Avatar
            Sjalabais

            Absolutely right, new Jeeps would be six digit cars here. The only new car for 2k$ is that tiny Mitsubishi. 🙂

    2. Ross Ballot Avatar
      Ross Ballot

      Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong, but the forward visibility out of a 900 is significantly better than out of a 5th/6th-gen Camaro. It can be executed properly or poorly…yes, it looks cool, but on the Camaro it completely hinders what you can see ahead of you…
      I don’t know much about the Telluride but it’s very much Borrego-meets-XC90, which is a good look for an SUV

      1. Sjalabais Avatar
        Sjalabais

        Oh, no doubt at all. Comparing the overall window area of these two turns gaga instantly:
        http://i0.wp.com/hooniverse.info/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/DSC_0095.jpg?w=700
        The Kia is gorgeous. They can afford to do everything in one swipe, not having to surf on heritage, and it is really well-executed.

  7. peugeotdude505 Avatar
    peugeotdude505

    What’s the story with the Slayer Scion?

    1. JayP Avatar
      JayP

      Don’t sweat it.
      It’s still lame.

  8. JayP Avatar
    JayP

    Jag had their SUV akimbo for the unwashed masses to ensconce at the Dallas show.
    The Bentley… as long as it keep them int he cool stuff like the Cayenne did for Porsche, then cool.

  9. smokyburnout Avatar
    smokyburnout

    My brother asked if we wanted to check out the Buick booth and I said no because I thought they had only brought production cars. Oops!
    When were you there? Looks much less crowded than Saturday was.

    1. Ross Ballot Avatar
      Ross Ballot

      Nice shot, I spotted the M1 as well! Love the hidden gems like that and the 1800. I was there just after the doors opened to the public on Friday. As for Buick, it was worth stopping by only if you like to be tortured by things you can’t have.