The Highway 1 List

Next Time Call the Welcome Wagon. After handing Lincoln-Mercury officials the key to the city last month during ceremonies welcoming the Ford Motor Co.’s luxury division to its new world headquarters in Irvine, Mayor Christina Shea quipped that she thought the key was “from a Chevy Blazer.” It couldn’t have been. Anyone who drives around Irvine knows full well that leather-upholstered Suburbans and Lincoln Navigators are the sport-utes of choice in that upscale town. But we bet Chevrolet appreciated the plug at a Ford function.

Give Him an A for Ingenuity. Wonder if the bean counters in Detroit who worry about the rising price of steel have heard this one? A car salesman in Dublin, Ireland, was ordered to pay almost $3,000 to a customer who charged that the salesman had sold him a defective used car. Seems the vehicle had rust-eaten chassis members that had been “repaired” with tightly folded newspapers hidden under a coating of painted resin. An automotive expert testified that had the paper fix come apart while the car was traveling more than 30 mph, the consequences could have been fatal. The salesman denied using the newspapers to make the repairs, but testimony showed that they were dated from the time he had owned the car.

Maybe Your Next Raise Will Cover the Payments! We’re not sure whom they think they’re kidding, but the Frankfurters who run Volkswagen say they plan to go after the little spenders, too, with an “entry-level” Bentley. Price for the car, which will be built on a platform shared by top-of-the-line VW and Audi models, will be about $110,000, Volkswagen sources say. Entry level? That’s about the same cost as four Honda Accords or Ford Tauruses or a sleek Jaguar XK8 convertible and a new Beetle, with enough left over for a couple of tanks of gas.

Exit Line. Comedian and car collector Jay Leno, co-hosting a charity drawing with fellow comedian-collector Jerry Seinfeld at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance earlier this month, suggested that the first fruit of the merger of Chrysler and Daimler-Benz should be “the Chrysler LeBaron von Richthofen.” The joke drew barely a giggle from the crowds eyeballing the fancy metal parked on the famed 18th green at Pebble. Which leads us to wonder if the state of education in the U.S. is so bad now that nobody got it, or if maybe the presence at the show this year of a large and stoic German contingent from Mercedes and Porsche--thefeatured marque--kept the response muted.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Comfortably Alarmed

When it comes to our cars and trucks, we Californians are more security-conscious and enamored of creature comforts than are car buyers in the rest of the U.S. We order more security systems, sunroofs, leather upholstery packages and automatic temperature-control systems than buyers in the rest of the U.S.

But researchers at Strategic Vision, a San Diego-based marketing firm, also found that we have an aversion to cruise control and anti-lock brakes. The company surveyed 85,411 buyers of 1997 model new cars and trucks, including 10,127 from California. A look at what percentage of vehicles were sold with various options.

Cars

*--*

Difference California Non-California pctge. pts. Security system 61% 47% 14 Sun/moon roof 36 28 8 Leather seats 33 25 8 Automatic temp. control 29 23 6 Power windows 81 77 4 Deluxe interior trim 34 32 2 Integrated child safety seat 6 4 2 Power door locks 82 81 1 Cellular or car phone 8 7 1 Power seats 40 40 0 Air conditioning 99 99 0 Trip computer 20 21 1 Anti-lock brakes 65 69 4 Cruise control 77 81 4 Total sample 6,371 44,453

*--*

Trucks

*--*

Difference California Non-California pctge. pts. Security system 52% 32% 20 Automatic temp. control 14 12 2 Leather seats 22 20 2 Air conditioning 99 97 2 Sun/moon roof 12 11 1 Trailer towing package 39 38 1 Integrated child safety seat 4 4 0 Power seats 39 39 0 Cellular or car phone 8 10 2 Power door locks 72 76 4 Power windows 71 75 4 Anti-lock brakes 82 86 -4 Trip computer 20 24 4 Deluxe interior trim 36 40 4 Cruise control 76 83 7 Total sample 3,756 30,831

*--*

Source: Strategic Vision Inc.