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Remembering: New York Auto Show, 1994
Carol Lee (@Carol_Lee), 9th July 2020
New York Auto Show, the premier automobile show of the North American continent. Since 1900 the definitive auto show of New York is held non-stop (albeit with some hiccups such as the human malware events this year), and with the help of the importance of Big Apple there’s no way the car show would be overshadowed by something else nearby (at least for now).
But today, we’re talking about the era where Forrest Gump is the hot new blockbuster, South Africa’s first multiracial elections are held and blobs were the biggest trend on cars. Yup, we’re talking about 1994, baby!
Admit that, I wasn’t even on the show that time, since I’m just a child that time, and everything is different in the mid-90s, but at least I have done some research beforehand since the lockdown makes us have some actual free time to spare. Despite all those research, inaccuracies may happen in this post, and that is always expected. Well, to the cars, I guess.
The biggest thing that we need to mention that year is the ambitious plan known as “NU-ERA”, a plan to kick start the American automakers to be more competitive after decades of tough times. A conference held by some of America’s largest automakers (Sliver-York, Farox, Rigore and Sisten) and the American government, a big plan to make more advanced, fuel efficient vehicles, and an engineering partnership to make sure this will happen in a good way.
The result? 4 tasteful, techy, innovative concept vehicles, created by all four of the American automakers, with their own style and substances despite everyone uses the same platform for the cars. Indeed, the project is a success after all, saving the American auto industry and the companies.
Down south to Brazil however, there’s an idea of a different future. A future where space is so confined and precious that everything needs to be smaller to accommodate everyone (which is kinda weird in this age of social distancing), Baltazar, with it’s weird looking “glass dome” shape (that contains no glass) and a flexible cabin design, means that the quirky compact car concept turns heads every time. Like promised, the production version came years later. Despite most of the innovations had to be dropped due to safety regulations, and it’s driving experience feels a bit bland then intended, it’s still a great car nonetheless.
On the performance side, we have the Tristella Noctua (not named after the CPU cooler company*), a classic 90s Italian supercar with the beauty to match. Equipped with the legendary 5.2 V10, the beast definitely preforms like a charm. With the experience of driving one years ago, when Drivers.com does not even exist, the handling feels responsive, and it’s excellent driving feel combined with its unexpected luxury makes it a perfect dream car for most people, if they know how to handle a 90s Italian monster.
Meanwhile in Japan, specifically Satsuo in 1994, they are creating the fabulous Velocia 320SX. The standard Velocia is kinda fine I guess, but what if somebody throw in an 3-liter turbo inline 5 inside the car? You guess. It’s awesome. Like really awesome. The car went on to become a icon in the car scene, and as far as I know, prices of these vehicles are flying every year due to the JDM craze, and most of these cars are modified to different styles and substances ranging from 1000hp drifters to track monsters and everything between.
Seikatsu, on the other hand, releases the CAT4, as one of the earliest crossover SUVs ever made. Yeah. A crossover in 1994, Crossovers are just everywhere these days, but in 1994, that’s sounds like science fiction. Imagine anyone wanting a oversized hatchback with some off-road kit. Hah.
Jokes aside, the CAT4 is excellent and reliable like most Seikatsus were. And the 90s SUV means a lot to me as my famliy owned one in 1995, which is an 2.0 N/A AWD model painted in red. I had great times having a passenger on one. I still remember the days where my mother took me to school with this SUV. Sadly, it was scrapped because it was involved in a crash at the year 2002. I’m feeling relieved that nobody involved had died or having major issues (despite having to stay at a hospital for a month), but I’m sad about the car being only exist inside the memories of mine since then.
And yeah, the bonkers Sirius-Zacspeed WR-GT2. That all-American GT2 fighter that went on to dominate the championships in that year? The famed racer is now one of the legends of the track that people love. With all those video games and the showcases of the car in subsequent events only does is to make their popularity rise even further.
So, here’s the end of the look back of the 1994 NYIAS. That’s the era where cars are literally filled with blobs, quirky blandness and a robust tech without the complicated stuff. We can’t return to the days since everything is improving, but that is one the era of cars everyone is missing on their lives since then.
* I fucking know that Noctua, the CPU cooler company, did not exist until like 2005 lol
Characters mentioned are fictional, if there’s anything similar should be taken as a coincidence.
Note: As this is not a true review by any means, there’s definitely some ommissions I have done on the post. Still, I appreciate all your creations and yeah, hopefully the next “retro” auto show threads will be as good as this! Droid’s out.
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I can very much assure you that this is not what happened
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What a downgrade
In my mind, it’s not so much a downgrade as it is a successful application of the Savante’s tech and some of its styling cues onto a production car. Well done to Farox, then.
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Would still drive. In fact the Savante-8 concept is my favourite of the four 
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