Bobble hats and forests - 1 August 2023

FOLLOW UP: ULEZ EXPANSION GIVEN GO AHEAD The High Court has ruled that the expansion to the ULEZ, as announced by the Mayor of London, is legal and allowed to take place. Five councils had brought the action against the increase in the area covered by the rules on vehicle emissions. You can find out more by clicking this BBC News article link here. ASTON MARTIN GETS NEW BOARD MEMBERFollowing their increased stake in Aston Martin, Geely are now entitled to a seat on the board of the sports car company. Daniel Li, the Geely CEO, has been appointed. Geely are the third largest shareholders, with 17% stake. Click this Automotive News Europe article link, to find out more. CLAIMS OVER TESLA RANGE MANIPULATION An article surfaced from Reuters claiming that Tesla has a secrete team who squash any complaints on the range of their cars, from customers. The claims centre around range exaggeration by the company creating an expectation in customer’s minds and them having to deal with the differences owners found. You can read that piece by clicking the Reuters link here. A well known YouTube EV specialists, Bjørn Nyland, has published a video discussing the article and pointing out areas he does not believe are correct, you can watch that by clicking this link here. BT TO CONVERT CABINETS TO EV CHARGERSBT, the telecoms giant, has announced it will convert on street cabinets to EV chargers once they are decommissioned as areas are serviced by full fibre systems. Starting in Northern Ireland in the autumn, a few cabinets will be converted to enable car charging before the project is rolled out across the UK. The expectation is up to 60,000 cabinets could be eligible for conversion. To find out more, click this edie article link here. SCAREMONGERING OVER MINERAL REQUIREMENTSMuch is said, online, about the need for precious metals and how much of them will be required as we move to electric cars. We are linking you to an article from the Financial Times that discusses this, explaining how we have the supplies but also the reality that some communities will be affected by the increase in mines and manufacturing. Click here to read more. If you like what we do, on this show, and think it is worth a £1.00, please consider supporting us via Patreon. Here is the link to that CLICK HERE TO SUPPORT THE PODCAST NEW NEW CAR NEWS - Lexus LMLexus has revealed their new range topping model, a luxury MPV. LM is the acronym for Luxury Mover, aimed at those who are to be transported in comfort that don’t want an SUV or saloon. The car will come with a 2.5 litre petrol hybrid powertrain and an optional extra electric motor. Length is just over five metres and a width slightly under 1.9m. Configuration will be either four or seven seats. Prices start at £89,995, running all the way up to £112,995 for the top of the range Takumi trim. Click here to read more, via an Autocar article. Kia SorentoKia has refreshed the Sorento with a new look to the front end that is linked to the EV9 design. The interior has also been spruced up, with a cleaner and clearer layout, which uses to the same screen layout first seen in the EV6. The expectation is the same powertrains will be used, which means the 2.2 diesel, 1.6 hybrid petrol and a plug-in hybrid petrol will be the propulsion options. Again there is no firm detail but prices are expected to be up on existing, with the entry level diesel starting at £42,000, moving to the range topping plug-in hybrid being around £50,000. To learn more, click this Autocar article link here. LUNCHTIME READ: CELEBRATING THE FESTIVAL OF THE UNEXCEPTIONALLast weekend saw the Festival of the Unexceptional take place at Grimsthorpe Castle in Lincolnshire. Always a firm favourite of this show, with Alan being particularly bitter at not being able to attend this year. You can find out more by clicking this article link from Hagerty here. As ever with these events, it is not just the cars that are being judged and on display that are fascinating but also the car park. CAR Magazine has a list of some of the more interesting cars that were brought to the event, which you can see by clicking here. LIST OF THE WEEK: THESE ARE THE CARS THAT DEFINED THE 2010SWhilst this is a US centric list there are plenty of the options shown that we also saw over here in the UK. The principles of some of the segments also will resonate with us on this side of the pond. Click here to see what Jalopnik think make the list. AND FINALLY: THE YOUTUBE CHANNEL SAVING VHS RALLY COVERAGEYouTube channel VHS Rallies is chock full of 1980s to 2000s rallying, mainly UK coverage. Whilst we don’t cover rallying anymore, due to not doing it justice, we are huge fans and still watch it. But, when did our love of it start? Back when we saw this stuff the first time around. Click this link to learn more, from Hagerty.