Core77

Guest post by John Cantwell and Eric Capper

One of the big features at the Detroit auto show this year was Electric Avenue, a 37,000-square foot indoor test track for the latest hybrid, electric and fuel cell cars. The course was set up in the basement of the Cobo convention center, adjacent from the area where the journalists ate their complementary boxed lunches during press previews.

The first thing you notice about Electric Avenue is what's not there—a cloud of exhaust, the rumble of combustion engines. There are trees and little shrubs planted around a winding concrete track. The smells of mulch, pine, moss, perhaps some kind of fertilizer, fill the air. The cars—a Tango commuter car, Mitsubishi's iMiEV, a Tahoe hybrid, among others—motor around in silence, emitting only an occasional tire squeak on a tight turn. An artificial waterfall trickles in the background; reporters are munching quietly on their soft turkey sandwiches. A small windmill sits motionless, because we are indoors, and there is no wind.

Electric Avenue is serene in its own way, the weird cousin of a Japanese tea garden.

We enter a registration line, where we must show our drivers licenses and blow into a Breathalyzer. The Breathalyzer seems like overkill until you remember: we are in Detroit with five thousand journalists. Everyone here could very well be rip-roaring drunk, right now, at 2 pm on a Tuesday.

We pass the test and wait for cars to open up. It really is remarkable how quiet the electric cars are; it feels like watching a (very slow) NASCAR race on mute. Their ninja-like stealth actually presents some interesting design challenges; manufacturers are now trying to develop warning noises to alert pedestrians when an electric car is barreling down the street.

Efforts are made to test drive the terrifically fast, $150,000, 3,300-pound Tango, which does 0-60 in about four seconds. The Tango is apparently a popular choice; we're told a journalist tried to make off with the Tango the day before...by cutting through a three-foot mulch/tree barrier. He must've snuck past the Breathalyzer station.

There will be no Tango-ing for us, sadly; the Tango rep (who must ride shotgun with all test-drivers) is taking his lunch break. Finally, a Mitsubishi iMiEV pulls up. It's a production model already on the streets in Japan; as such, the driver's seat is on the right side. The iMiEV is fun and zippy, and Eric wonders aloud about doing some off-roading.

The Mitsubishi technician in the passenger seat does not seem amused.

Next, the THINK car, from Scandinavia. It's a bare-bones little vehicle, with plastic body panels and no power steering. It glides silently through the odd Electric Avenue landscape, past the windmill and the fake waterfall. The American version, we're told, will have power steering.

The test drives over, we are both asked to take a brief survey before leaving Electric Avenue. One of the questions is something along the lines of: "Will you consider purchasing an electric car in the near future?" We both answer "Maybe."