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Poor headlights cause 40 cars to miss IIHS Top Safety Pick rating

Over the past few months, we've noticed a number of cars and SUVs that have come incredibly close to earning one of the IIHS's highest accolades, the Top Safety Pick rating. They have great crash test scores and solid automatic emergency braking and forward collision warning systems. What trips them up is headlights. That got us wondering, how many vehicles are there that are coming up short because they don't have headlights that meet the organization's criteria for an "Acceptable" or "Good" rating. This is a revision made after 2017, a year in which headlights weren't factored in for this specific award. This is also why why some vehicles, such as the Ford F-150, might have had the award last year, but have lost it for this year. We reached out to someone at IIHS to find out. He responded with the following car models. Depending on how you count, a whopping 40 models crash well enough to receive the rating, but don't get it because their headlights are either "Poor" or "Marginal." We say depending on how you count because the IIHS actual counts truck body styles differently, and the Infiniti Q70 is a special case. Apparently the version of the Q70 that has good headlights doesn't have adequate forward collision prevention technology. And the one that has good forward collision tech doesn't have good enough headlights. We've provided the entire list of vehicles below in alphabetical order. Interestingly, it seems the Volkswagen Group is having the most difficulty providing good headlights with its otherwise safe cars. It had the most models on the list at 9 split between Audi and Volkswagen. GM is next in line with 7 models. It is worth noting again that though these vehicles have subpar headlights and don't quite earn Top Safety Pick awards, that doesn't mean they're unsafe. They all score well enough in crash testing and forward collision prevention that they would get the coveted award if the lights were better.

Jim Lentz exposes more details behind Toyota's move to Texas

Toyota's North American CEO Jim Lentz has already given us a rough idea of what prompted the company's surprise move to the Dallas suburb of Plano, TX from its longstanding headquarters in Torrance, CA. A new story from The Los Angeles Times, though, delivers even more detail from Lentz on the reasoning for the move, what other cities were considered and why the company's current host city wasn't even in the running.
Of course, one of the more popular reasons being bandied about includes the $40 million Texas was set to give the company for the move, as well as the state's generous tax rates. According to Lentz, though, the reason Toyota chose Plano over a group of finalists made up of Atlanta, Charlotte and Denver, was far simpler than that - it was about consolidating its marketing, sales, engineering and production teams in a region that's closer to the company's seat of manufacturing in the south.
"It doesn't make sense to have oversight of manufacturing 2,000 miles away from where the cars were made," Lentz told The Times. "Geography is the reason not to have our headquarters in California."

2019 Detroit Auto Show Special | Autoblog Podcast #568

This week's Autoblog Podcast is a special one, recorded from Cobo Center in Detroit, site of the 2019 North American International Auto Show (NAIAS). Editor-in-Chief Greg Migliore is first joined by Senior Editor Alex Kierstein and Consumer Editor Jeremy Korzeniewski to talk about the Toyota Supra, Ford Shelby GT500 and Subaru STI S209. Then Senior Editor, Green, John Snyder and Associate Editor Joel Stocksdale join Greg to discuss the Nissan IMs Concept, new Ford Explorer and Kia Telluride, before going over the Editors' Picks for the best cars of the Detroit Auto Show. Autoblog Podcast #568 Get The Podcast iTunes – Subscribe to the Autoblog Podcast in iTunes RSS – Add the Autoblog Podcast feed to your RSS aggregator MP3 – Download the MP3 directly Rundown 2020 Toyota Supra 2020 Ford Mustang Shelby GT500 2019 Subaru WRX STI S209 Nissan IMs Concept 2020 Ford Explorer (including ST and Hybrid) 2020 Kia Telluride Best in Show: 2019 Detroit Auto Show Editors' Picks Feedback Email – Podcast@Autoblog.com Review the show on iTunes Related Video: