Having built an empire on renting beat-up cars at bargain prices, Rent-A-Wreck is now trying to polish its image, reports Charlie Szold in USA Today (7/21/10). Rent-A-Wreck actually has done well through the economic downturn, but the trick is going to be keeping its customers as conditions improve. Part of its strategy involves urging its franchisees to buy better, and flashier, used cars. A Rent-A-Wreck in Baltimore now offers late-model Hummers, Lincolns and Mercedes, for instance.

This both attracts customer and saves on repair costs -- not to mention reducing the risk that the car will break down and disappoint the customer. In another big change, Rent-A-Wreck now enables its customers to book rentals online, which forces "franchisees to reserve cars for people sight unseen for the first time." Some franchisees weren't thrilled with this idea. "Our business has always been about the phone book," says Larry Kirmsee, a franchisee since 1979. "If you were at the front page of the phone book, you were getting most of the calls."

Larry and other franchisees came around "once they saw reservations and cash start flowing." Rent-A-Wreck, which was purchased by the Fitzgerald Auto Mall in 2006, is also now working with travel search sites like Kayak. Of course, for customers, it's still all about the experience: "My biggest thing is how I'm being treated," says Rob Jones, who recently rented a Mercedes-Benz SLK 280 two-seater, paying $414 for two days. One thing that won't change is the Rent-A-Wreck brand name, partly because it has pretty good name recognition, but mostly just because owner Jack Fitzgerald loves it.

IBM is working with the New Jersey Turnpike Authority to make traffic as predictable as the weather, reports Ken Belson in the New York Times (6/6/10). The initiative uses "complex algorithms and analytics ... to predict traffic patterns up to an hour into the future on state roads." It will not only alert "drivers to accidents, bottlenecks and dangerous conditions but also estimate what traffic will be like in 10, 20 or more minutes, helping drivers to make choices."

The application uses a combination of "incoming data and historical patterns" to forecast "how traffic will react on various roads under differing conditions." Brian Gorman, director of information technology for the authority, "equated the software's predictions with a weather map that shows approaching thunderstorms -- rather than producing a single prediction for all areas, it provides traffic forecasts for a series of locations."

The updates will be communicated to drivers via "variable message signs in the state," of which New Jersey plans to have 200 by 2012. The authority also plans to expand its number of advisory radio transmitters from 19 to 26. The goal is "to use the prediction software to get drivers out of their cars and into buses and trains, reducing traffic." As traffic expert Tom Gustafson explains, "To the extent you can move individuals to other routes off highways, then freight will have fewer obstacles in its way as well."

That voice on your GPS might belong to Karen Jacobsen -- popularly known as Australian Karen, reports Bruce Feiler in the New York Times (6/27/10). The odds are pretty good because Karen's voice turns up on GPS devices made by Garmin, Tom Tom and others. Her voice-over philosophy is simple: "When you're in the car, alone at night, on a dark road, and you don't know where you're going, this voice, even though it's coming from a machine, becomes a human being you trust ... It becomes a member of the family," she says.

For some men, that voice becomes all that and something more. There are even a couple of websites (gpspassion and pdastreet) whose forums reveal a certain male infatuation not only with Australian Karen, but also American Jill. Karen acknowledges "a few snarky comments" but is more concerned with trying to turn her navigatrix following into a singing and inspirational speaking career. Her message: "You can 'recalculate' anytime in life." She also suggests that her GPS work helps people's marriages because she takes "the focus off blaming one person or the other."

The early GPS systems featured mostly male voices. "When the key dimension is competence, the male voice is better," says Clifford I. Nass, a communications professor. "When the key dimension is likability, the female voice is better." As confidence in GPS technology increased, the likability became more important than competence. Female voices have also been traditionally preferred in airplane navigation devices and warning systems because they stood out from among the male crewmembers and men tend to pay more attention to them, although pilots commonly refer to the voice as "Bitching Betty."

Yokohama Tire is making tires using "a processing oil that is derived from orange peels," reports Steven Ashley in the New York Times (6/20/10). Gives a whole new meaning to "peel out." Yokohama is one of a number of tire-makers finding ways to reduce the amount of petrochemicals in its products. It sources its orange peels from a nearby orange-juice factory.

The coolest part is that "the orange oil compound works to reduce rolling resistance by about a fifth over conventional treads ... but in cornering and braking maneuvers it quickly generates heat that softens the rubber tread to deliver better grip." Not to be outdone, Michelin makes a tire that "uses sunflower oil in its formulation for improved traction at low temperatures and shorter braking distances in the wet."

While admirable, such efforts have far less environmental impact than simply making the tires more fuel efficient. "Only 12 percent of the carbon dioxide emissions associated with tires arise from the raw materials and manufacturing," says Forrest Patterson of Michelin. About 86 percent is related to fuel consumption. There's also the environmental impact of the "300 million tires that domestic drivers discard each year." The tires can be re-used for any number of purposes and "some of these recycled materials are reused in tires."

"We're in the credibility business," says David Burroughs, chief executive of Bloomington Gold, a car show that celebrates the Corvette, reports Paul Ingrassia in the Wall Street Journal (6/24/10). David's outlook was shaped at a Corvette car show in Bloomington, Illinois he attended back in the early 70s. He found the judging criteria inconsistent, and eventually took over the show, imposing a simple standard: "no better, no worse, no different." David's idea was to evaluate vintage 'Vettes by how well "they've been preserved or restored to their original condition."

At the show, judges "evaluate the exterior, the interior, the engine and the chassis. Even a square-head bolt gets a demerit if the original was round." Winning cars receive one of three designations: "Gold Certified, Survivor and Benchmark -- the last meaning that the car is in near-mint condition with mostly original parts." This year's show also included an exhibit "of historically significant Corvettes, including the prototype displayed at the 1953 Motorama (image)."

Says David: "What I want to leave behind is a documented history of how all this unfolded. How did this car create a loyal fan base and then become a phenomenon?" It's a good question, given that the first Corvettes were so awful (six cylinders and two-speed automatic transmissions) that General Motors nearly killed it after the first two years. It was only after Zora Arkus-Duntov, a GM engineer, sent a memo making a case for a more muscular approach that the car took off. Zora's memo, along with his ashes, are now enshrined at the National Corvette Museum in Bowling Green, Kentucky.

As recently as 1998, Lincoln was the number-one luxury car in America, but now it's number eight, reports Matthew Dolan in the Wall Street Journal (6/28/10). In 2000, Lincoln sold 193,000 cars but in 2009, its tally was just 82,847. Brand identity is at the core of its problem: "That's the car that brings you to the airport, that's the car that you rent for prom night," says Rebecca Lindland of IHS Automotive. "It's a bad thing in that consumers don't see it as an aspirational vehicle."

Maybe it doesn't help that the 2011 Lincoln MKS is built on the same platform as the Ford Taurus -- which, stickered at $26,700 is priced about $15,000 less than the Lincoln. The Taurus meanwhile has assumed certain trappings of luxury, like leather seats and 19-inch wheels, for instance. Apparently this is enough for some to consider the Taurus as something like a luxury brand, where the Lincoln just doesn't quite cut it. "They always seemed like a big boat with loose handling," says Ronnie Lohr, who recently replaced his Infiniti with a Taurus.

Turning this situation around for Lincoln won't be easy for its maker, the Ford Motor Co. Killing Ford's Mercury plate might free up more resources for Lincoln, and the plan is to introduce "seven new or significantly improved Lincolns in the next four years, including a small luxury car and a new MKZ midsize sedan." In the meantime, what buyers it does have aren't getting any younger: "The average age of a Lincoln buyer is 64." And loyalty is lacking: "Just 40 percent of Lincoln owners turn in their Lincolns for another Lincoln," according to JD Power & Associates.

"The human urge to settle, to make a home, contended always with American wanderlust," writes Bill Kauffman in a Wall Street Journal review of "The King's Best Highway," by Eric Jaffe (6/21/10). It's a comment on the history and development of U.S. Routes 1 and 20, also known as the Boston Post Road and originally "a series of Indian paths wending their way from Boston to New York City" called the "king's best highway." Hard to believe now, what with Chuck E. Cheese and all, but the "early wilderness trail paths were often no more than 18 inches wide."

As the American colonies grew, the roadway between Boston and New York came to represent "a conduit of cultural progress" as Eric puts it, and by 1700 was the pipeline of the postal service, with inns along the way doubling as post offices. Ben Franklin, as deputy postmaster general, sought to bring order to the chaos, instructing carriers not to stop to talk to anyone, or do anything that might cause a delivery delay. Highway repair was done by locals, block-party style, including "ample time for foot races, drinking and general merriment."

Federal aid to highways was firmly in place by the 1920s, and after World War II, "engineers and bureaucrats grabbed the wheel," levelling city neighborhoods as a sacrifice to the gods of transportation. Community and beauty -- not to mention property rights -- became anachronisms. Families were ordered about by 'relocation workers.' Urban renewal and highway construction demolished churches, shops and even 17th century graveyards ... The road -- once the carrier of beneficial progress -- had become a hostile invader ... Somewhere, it seems, America took a wrong turn on the Post Road."

A newfangled, energy-generating shock absorber that can improve fuel economy owes its origins to the potholes of Boston, reports Anne Eisenberg in the New York Times (6/6/10). It was while a student in Boston, at M.I.T., that Shakeel Avadhany learned that "the bumps and jolts of vehicles on rough roads" could be converted "into usable electricity." So, he and some fellow students designed GenShocks, a shock absorber that can lower "fuel consumption by one to six percent, depending on road conditions."

The bumpier the better. GenShocks "look like ordinary shock absorbers with an electrical power cord at one end. They plug into a power box that regulates the electricity they produce, putting it out at a voltage required by the truck, car or bus." The "kinetic energy of the bounces" generates watts that can run "the vehicle's windshield wipers, fans or dashboard lights, for example." The technique is known as "energy harvesting," which basically is all about capturing and using the vehicle's "waste heat."

Edwin L. Thomas, Shakeel's former M.I.T. professor, explains that when a vehicle hits a pothole, it moves both up and down and sideways. "It's like a sprinter who has to also run hurdles," he says. But GenShocks, which work on both hybrid and regular vehicles, take that otherwise wasted energy and put it to good use. Shakeel says his pothole shocks cost a bit more than the conventional kind, "but you will get those dollars back through improved fuel economy." He expects GenShocks to be "on the market in the second quarter of 2011."

A potentially game-changing technology for electric cars was first introduced by Ferdinand Porsche in 1900, reports the Economist (4/24/10). Ferdinand "put electric motors into the hubs of the wheels of the Lohner-Porsche, a vehicle which made its debut at the 1900 World's Fair in Paris. It was a hybrid car that relied on both batteries and a generator to produce electricity for its motors. Capable of more than 35 mph, it also set a number of speed records."

The idea of having a motor built into a wheel's hub, "rather than having a single motor driving the wheels via a mechanical transmission," is now "likely to become the most widely used drive system," according to its proponents. Not only does the concept dispense with "the traditional engine bay," and lend itself to four-wheel drive, but "hub motors save space and weight because there is no need for a mechanical transmission ... With software monitoring each wheel, stability and traction control can also be built-in."

Michelin "is developing a system called Active Wheel," which in addition to hub motors "contains a second electric motor to operate an active suspension system that is also built into the wheel hub." This "could make other conventional parts, like shock absorbers, unnecessary." It could also "transform Michelin from being a tire-maker "into an engine and suspension supplier as well." So, not only might hub motors change "the shape and the dynamics of the vehicles themselves ... but also those of automotive companies, too."

"This thing solves the convertible problem, the sports-car problem, the all-wheel drive problem," says Herb Bornack, as reported by Joseph B. White in the Wall Street Journal (4/28/10). The "thing" to which Herb is referring is his new Acura ZDX. Herb, who is 55, had been driving a Porsche Boxster, "but he and his wife wanted a sporty vehicle that also had all-wheel drive, an automatic transmission and a higher, SUV-style seating position."

What it doesn't have is much "rearward visibility," because of the ZDX's "fastback roof line." Nor does it have much legroom in the back, but that doesn't matter because Herb, who is six-foot-one, "is not sitting back there." The ZDX is what Acura calls a "four-door sports coupe." It also calls the ZDX a "segment buster" in that it "doesn't fit into the mainstream categories most consumers recognize."

Most cars "are boxes on wheels" but the ZDX is all "swoopy and curvy" and "attempts ... to break out of the tyranny of boxes" with a design that's both sporty and functional. BMW is on a similar path with its X6. Both cars are "low-volume niche vehicles designed for people who don't want to act their age." In other words, Acura and BMW sell only about 5,000 of these cars per year, mostly to Baby Boomers. They manage the small production runs by sharing "hardware and engineering" with their other, mass-market models.