Steve Shannon in a recent interview (from Geneva) as told to TTELA, the local Trollhattan newspaper:

Steve Shannon sees some new behavior when people buy a car:

- “They choose to go down in size, or alternatively in engine size. Look at midsize sedans as an example. Historically, 80% chose the 6-cylinder engine and 20% the 4-cylinder. Now it is the opposite, and we see that ourselves for the Aero-model.”

He is more open compared to the rest of the Saab management, and declare that he will have both the new 9-5 and the new 9-4X to work with during the last quarter of 2009.

- “So, in 2010 things will start to happen.”
- “I can’t say much about the new 9-5, but it will have good engines and good chassis.”

And the 9-4X?

- “It will be successful. Car-based crossovers is one of the hottest segments in the US. I’m already counting down the days!”

With thanks to ctm.

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It’s not necessarily Saab-related, but today’s Autoblog entry by John McElroy has a good look at plug-in hybrids and the future of CAFE regulations. They’re hinting at pushed for mileage figures up around 70mpg in the future and I fully believe they’ll go for that within my lifetime (the next legislated goal is 35mpg).

My advice - it’s time to buy an old car so that you can continue to enjoy the pure pleasure of real, engaged driving. Three generations from now, space-age petrol heads will probably look back on us as the lucky ones.

Interestingly, the enviromentalists that he interviewed for his TV show express a preference for a plug-in hybrid with its engine running on cellulosic ethanol. I wonder who could do that?

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When I first saw the pictures, I wondered out loud about the BMW X6.

In short, I think this vehicle is for poseurs. I think BMW are getting carried away with their own success and much like Toyota?s recent reliability problems and dropped ratings, they are prime candidates for being victims of their own success and arrogance.

Read these reviews (TTAC and Jalopnik) and you’ll see that it’s quite possibly the most arrogant vehicle in the world. I was going to call it useless as well as the rear looks kind of limited for space with the way the screen slopes down, seemingly forever. It appears, though, that the sheer monstrous bulk of this car means there is still a lot of space there.

79% of voters in the poll associated with my quote above agreed with me that the X6 is as ugly as a bashed crab and a surprising majority of commenters on those reviews are wondering what the X6 is supposed to be, so it seems we’re not alone.

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The Chevy Camaro has been spotted at the Nurburgring, sans the usual cammo that pre-production vehicles normally wear. It seems that GM are being true to Bob Lutz’s word that it’d be seen testing in public and there’d be no disguises.

It hasn’t dampened interest at all, which makes for an interesting precedent.

So where’s our new 9-5, then??????

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I’d like to point out something to the GM Next team. Hopefully someone from GM is reading this today and can pass it on.

Please, please, please fix up your RSS feed. All it shows right now are the titles, which contain no hint at all as to which brand a story is dealing with. I had 7 or 8 stories on my feed this morning and if you think I’m going to load each and every one of them just to find that none are about Saab - think again.

Here’s a screenshot so you know what I’m on about. Click to enlarge.

And yes, I do have all that blue on my screen setup. Looks natural to me.