A new 80mph limit on Britain’s motorways?

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

All told, Transport Secretary Philip Hammond (above, no relation) has had a busy first year in the job.

One his first acts in government was to take a pneumatic drill to the M4 bus-lane, which as you'll have seen on TV made Jeremy very happy. Then he declared there would be no more Whitehall cash for speed cameras, which as you'll have seen on TV made the entire Top Gear studio very happy.

Now he's revealed that the coalition government is consulting on plans to raise the speed limit on Britain's motorways to 80mph in 2013.

The current 70mph limit was introduced in 1965, and as the Transport Secretary points out, it's now looking rather out of date due to the "huge advances in safety and motoring technology".

"Cars are much safer, they have more sophisticated equipment now than they did 40 or so years ago. They are capable of driving safely at higher speeds. There are enormous economic benefits to be had by increasing the speed limit and shortening journey times.

"And the current limit has lost its legitimacy. We all know that many, many motorists who are otherwise law-abiding citizens routinely ignore the 70 miles per hour limit."

Mr Hammond also said he not think the rise would have "a significant impact on safety".

It's not a universally popular proposal. David Williams, the CEO of motoring assist company GEM, is one dissenting voice, saying: "I simply cannot understand this. From a road safety perspective we believe it would be a disaster.

"There are very obvious road safety implications including drivers having less time to react at higher speeds. Given the road safety record is currently heading in the wrong direction, this alone is a good enough reason not to raise the limit.

"Then there's the environmental aspect. An increase in speed will have a huge influence on our fuel consumption and emissions.

"To say an increase will improve the economy is frankly ridiculous - unless of course they are looking at the duty they will receive in revenue from the increased use of fuel? It seems this move is being made to deflect the real issues that cause delays in journeys such as road works and potholes."

So where do you sit on the debate, TopGear.commers? A long-needed acknowledgment of modern motoring technology, or a recipe for disaster?

Career Advisor

New Automobile

Read More

Good news! Britain's building more engines

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

Yes, Jaguar Land Rover is going to build a brand new factory in Wolverhampton that will, in three or four years, start churning out all-new engines. And this says a lot about where the company expects to be in half a decade's time.

The factory is to build four-cylinder engines - lots of them. It's costing £355 million to build, and will employ 750 people.

Jaguar Land Rover's highly sophisticated V8 motors, and the brand-new related V6 it showed in the C-X16 at the Frankfurt Motor Show, will continue to be built by Ford in Wales. So there will still be fast luxurious top-range Jags and Range Rovers.

But the company wants to expand, and the significant volume growth will be done by moving to smaller cars with smaller (but still fairly powerful) engines. These are the engines that will be made in Wolverhampton. BMW, Audi and Mercedes are going the same way - more smaller cars, and more big cars with smaller engines.

We've already seen this with the new Range Rover Evoque. All its engines are four-cylinders, and yet it's a vehicle that can convincingly sell for £50k once you add the options.

Jaguar will go the same way. In three years' time it will launch a rival for the BMW 3-series. A year or so after that, there will be a compact Jaguar crossover - even more road-biased than the Evoque, obviously, to make sure there isn't internal cannibalisation.

Jaguar Land Rover is actually in a better position than most luxury makers to launch four-cylinder engines, because its cars will be light. They're working on something called the ‘premium lightweight architecture', an aluminium structure that shaves at least 150kg off steel rivals. Lighter cars are easier to propel, so they can be more economical with the same performance using a smaller engine. This lightweight architecture starts big, with the 2012 Range Rover and 2013 Range Rover Sport, but it can be adapted and shrunk right down to the level of these relatively small Jags.

We know these engineers can design great powerplants: look at the current V8. But it's a huge investment by their owners, Tata of India, to commit to designing a family of new four-cylinder engines, and to making it in the UK.

When the company was first taken over, people talked with grave concern about jobs being moved offshore. They needn't have worried.

View the original article here

Peliculas Online

Read More