2003 Bmw X5 4.4i Sport Utility 4-door 4.4l on 2040-cars

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On Location in California with BMW and Mini

A mid-winter escape from frigid Michigan to drive a trio of new BMW and Mini products? It'd be a busy couple of days, but you can't argue with Southern California in February. The temperatures in LA, where we drove the Mini Cooper S Convertible, hovered in the mid-80s, and it was solidly in the 70s further north, at Monterey, where we drove the M2 and X4 M40i. The highlight of the trip was Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, which is a rewarding track to drive in a street car. The M2 was a blast there. The canyon roads above Malibu in the Mini were a close second, but even the lazy drive down the PCH to Big Sur was a blast. More important is the California state of mind we were in when driving all three of these cars. I've spent a lot of time in this state, and it has a complicated relationship with the car – and there's also a huge difference in attitude between the greater Bay Area and Southern California. Ample sun and twisty roads clash with image-consciousness, eco-consciousness, and brutal urban gridlock, and each BMW dealt with that paradox admirably, in its own way. Take a quick jaunt to California with me and check out the locations and experiences that helped form our impressions of these vehicles: the 2016 BMW M2 First Drive, the 2016 Mini Cooper S Convertible First Drive, and the 2016 BMW X4 M40i Quick Spin.

Recharge Wrap-up: electric taxis in Montreal, Sebastien Buemi leads Formula E testing

Sebastien Buemi leads the pack in the second session of Formula E pre-season testing. Buemi, driving for Renault e.dams, set a new lap record at Donington Park with a time of 1:31.050s. Buemi says that, with a little bit of work, he feels like he could shave off another second or more. "We could do quite a bit on the car and the car is a bit easier to drive, the stability is better, the brakes are better," he says. "I see some good potential, we just need to extract it from the car." Sam Bird was the second fastest during the testing session, followed by Daniel Abt. Read more in the press release below. A Montreal taxi company plans to create a fleet of 2,000 electric taxis by 2019. Taxi Hochelaga currently has the city's second largest fleet with 500 taxis currently in service. Owner Alexandre Taillefer believes this large fleet of green taxis will help the company compete with ride services like Uber and Lyft. "We want to be an alternative to the second car and even to the first," says Taillefer. "We will reduce traffic on the roads and pollution." The company's first electric cabs could be in service as early as November. Read more at Green Car Reports, or, if you speak French, at Le Journal de Montreal. DriveNow is open to franchising. The carsharing company, owned by BMW and rental company Sixt, will allow third parties to operate the DriveNow program in certain cities, according to a report. DriveNow is set to launch a fleet of 400 electric cars in Copenhagen, Denmark with the help of Arriva Plc. Read more from Automotive News Europe. Kandi Technologies Group Inc. on Monday reported second-quarter net income of $5.4 million. On a per-share basis, the Jinhua, China-based company said it had profit of 12 cents. Earnings, adjusted for non-recurring gains, were 10 cents per share. The electric and all-terrain vehicle maker posted revenue of $48 million in the period. For the current quarter ending in October, Kandi Tech said it expects revenue in the range of $49 million to $51 million. Kandi Tech shares have dropped 45 percent since the beginning of the year. The stock has fallen 59 percent in the last 12 months. The AP contributed to this report. BUEMI STAYS ON TOP IN SECOND TEST Renault e.dams driver heads field for consecutive days at Donington Park DONINGTON PARK, UK (August 11 2015): Sebastien Buemi broke the Formula E lap record at Donington Park as he once again set the fastest time in pre-season testing.

Zombie cars: Discontinued vehicles that aren't dead yet

Car models come and go, but as revealed by monthly sales data, once a car is discontinued, it doesn't just disappear instantly. And in the case of some models, vanishing into obscurity can be a slow, tedious process. That's the case with the 12 cars we have here. All of them have been discontinued, but car companies keep racking up "new" sales with them. There are actually more discontinued cars that are still registering new sales than what we decided to include here. We kept this list to the oldest or otherwise most interesting vehicles still being sold as new, including a supercar. We'll run the list in alphabetical order, starting with *drumroll* ... BMW 6 Series: 55 total sales BMW quietly removed the 6 Series from the U.S. market during the 2019 model year. It had been available in three configurations, a hardtop coupe, a convertible and a sleek four-door coupe-like shape.   BMW i8: 18 total sales We've always had a soft spot for the BMW i8, despite the fact that it never quite fit into a particular category. It was sporty, but nowhere near as fast as similarly-priced competitors. It looked very high-tech and boasted a unique carbon fiber chassis design and a plug-in hybrid powertrain, but wasn't really designed for maximum efficiency or maximum performance. Still, the in-betweener was very cool to look at and drive, and 18 buyers took one home over the course of 2021.   Chevy Impala: 750 total sales The Impala represented classic American tastes at a time when American tastes were shifting away from soft-riding sedans with big interior room and trunk space and into higher-riding crossovers. A total of 750 sales were inked last year.   Chrysler 200: 15 total sales The Chrysler 200 was actually a pretty nice sedan, with good looks and decent driving dynamics let down by a lack of roominess, particularly in the back seat. Of course, as we said regarding the Chevy Impala, the number of Americans in the market for sedans is rapidly winding down, and other automakers are following Chrysler's footsteps in canceling their slow-selling four-doors. Even if Chrysler never really found its footing in the ultra-competitive midsize sedan segment, apparently dealerships have a few leftover 2017 200s floating around. And for some reason, 15 buyers decided to sign the dotted line to take one of these aging sedans home last year.