Yellow Vests block Major Roads, Cause Transport Chaos In France

Reuters reports French “yellow vest” protesters wreaked havoc with road transport on Tuesday by occupying autoroute toll booths and even torching some of them. France’s biggest toll road operator, Vinci Autoroutes , said there were demonstrations at 40 of its sites and that several highway intersections had been heavily damaged, mainly in southern of France.

The Bandol toll station, near Marseille in the south of France, suffered fire damage on Tuesday and the A50 highway was closed, said Vinci, whose network is mainly in the south and west of the country.

“Motorists should take utmost care as they approach toll gates and motorway access ramps due to the presence of numerous pedestrians,” Vinci said in a statement.

People have died in roadside accidents at yellow vest roadblocks in recent weeks, mostly at roundabouts blocked by groups of demonstrators. The ‘yellow vests’ protesters – named after the fluorescent jackets French motorists must have in their cars – have blocked roads and roundabouts across France since mid-November.

The demonstrations began as a protest against fuel tax increases, but have since grown into a bigger backlash against the policies of French President Emmanuel Macron.

Over the past four Saturdays, demonstrators have torched cars, looted shops and clashed with police in Paris and other French cities, although protests in the capital last weekend were smaller and more peaceful than previous ones.

Index of posts on France

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As Bad News Continues To Pile Up For Tesla and EV Fans …

As Bad News Continues To Pile Up For Tesla and EV Fans …

Tesla model 3 (source : https://indideevs.com/ )

With a spate of fatal and near fatal crashes raising doubts about the safety of the power storage system in Tesla sports models, the corporate stock exchange valuation taking hit after hit and Elon Musk’s promises looking more and more unrealistic as the company’s operating deficit gets bigger and bigger, today has brought another shock for fanboys of Tesla and electric vehicles in general.

The progress of the Tesla Model 3, which was supposed to be the “entry-level” electric vehicle for the middle class, that would take electric cars into the volume market has been beset failures to meet promised production levels as well as technical setbacks.

Leading up to the launch of the Model 3, it was positioned as the people’s EV, the electric car that everybody could afford, rather than being just a toy for virtue signalling liberal luvvies. Once in mass production, Musk promised, economies of scale would help the cash burning Tesla Corp. generate cash and profits consistently. The car’s relatively modest $35,000 price tag (Only about $10k more expensive than comparable Ford, GM or Volkswagen models,) was heralded as one of its key selling points, low enough that Tesla could generate the volume needed to gain operating leverage by selling it to the masses.

But as Elon Musk himself admitted this weekend on Twitter, selling a $35,000 Model 3 right now would cause Tesla to “lose money and die”. So, instead of selling this mass-market vehicle, Tesla has focused on selling a more expensive version of the vehicle. A much, much more expensive version, in fact more than double the base price. Yes, $70k for a very ordinary family car with a proven tendency to incinerate its occupants.

A lot of bollocks has been talked about Tesla cars, surely the public (apart from sceptics like me who know that the current generation of EVs have no more chance of being commercially successful that the first battery powered automobile, launched in 1829, and for the same reasons. Technology may have improved a zillion times since then, but so has what we expect an automobile to be able to do for us.

Tesla’s $35,000 Model 3 Could Now Cost You $78,000 – Bloomberg

Ever dreamed of having a stretch limo with a jacuzzi on board?

A few years ago on American blog sites there was a thing going round with the label “You know you’re a redneck when …”

Things that came up were along the lines of “You know you’re a redneck when your lawn has more scrap cars than your wife has teeth”.

Or “You know you’re a redneck when your sister is your aunt.” (Could equally apply to people from Norfolk of course.)

One certain redneck identifier however is the ability to find really creative ways to use that old pick up truck that has been in the yard for years because you never got round to fixing it up (well brewing up crystal math just eats up so much time)

I think this one takes the prize …

And what a great way to utilize a spare tarp.

Whoa There, Fiat, This Is A Family Newspaper

So there I was just flicking through BBC’s copy of the Independent when I came across an item advertizing the Fiat 500.
The blurb went something along the lines of “We’ve made our little car a bit bigger so if you have a family you can still have a cinquecento.”

But then it continued that if you didn’t have a family you might like to park up somewhere private and get down to the business of trying to create one.

What???

This is a family newspaper!

Aren’t these organs of information dissemination meant to be a little bit responsible?

Should they really be featuring ads encouraging such wanton behaviour in public?

Or is it safe advertising your cars capacity for flagrant fornification as long as it comes in the poly-bagged section?

A couple of days later we followed a bus with the following advert displayed on the back,

“Child restraints in cars save lives.”

Perhaps for all Cinquecento drivers that should read,
“Restraint in cars saves births.”

Geneva Motor Show: Genius Or Geekery Gone Mad.

The Geneva Motor Show in recent years has become less about cars than gadgets. Like SxSW in Houston, Texas which used to be a music festival but has gone the same way, these gatherings are now mutual maturbations sessions for geeks and gadget freaks.

This years Geneva show is mostly about electric cars that you don’t have to drive, a computer does all the fun stuff for you. So you pootle along at 12mph in a vehicle designed to go nowhere slowly and you are not driving. You might as well get the bus with all the other losers.

The Honda Diji, the outer skin of which is a giant, curvaceous screen that can display just about anything that can be put on a screen. But not much room for a to get you leg over in the back seat. Not that the geeks who designed it would ever think of getting their leg over while there are gadgets to play with.

Electric cars are a pipe dream for sad acts. And cars that drive themselves? Well they must rely on Sat Nav and anyone who has followed Boggart Blog for a while will know how reliable sat nav is. (or you cn check out our sat nav stories in the related posts list at the foot of this article)

Yes, while the wide eyed politicians and the geekocracy are burbling excitedly about electric cars and hybrids saving the planet there is little talk of what a filthy, enery intensive process manufacturing the batteries is (Why do you think Union Carbide moved their manufacturing plants from Europe and the USA to Bophal, India. Yes, THAT Bophal. And there is even less talk of how expensive electric or hybrid cars are and how a replacement battery pack for an average sized car costs around £8,000.

Hmm, so that second hand Prius with just three months warranty you’ve been offered for a knock down price doesn’t look quite such a bargain now does it? Unless of course you are one of those twunts that thinks computers will soon be able to think like humans, that advances in medical science will enable us to live forever and that we are just a whisker away from interstellar travel.

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Life In The fast Lane

The debate still rages over the excellent news that the Transport Minister Richard Hammond, er, no, sorry that should have been Phil Hammond, no relation of course, wants to raise the motorway speed limit to 80mph.

Whenever I travel on motorways it is obvious that at least half of the people are driving at roundabout 75 to 80 mph, with some daring to go a steady 90mph and the occasional boy racer or middle aged man in a flash car steaming, and that’s not just hubby, down the outside lane at well over a ton.

But the anti driving lobby will no doubt complain about the increased liklihood of accidents and deaths due to the increase in the speed limit.

Of course the obvious answer is that you don’t have to drive at 80mph if you don’t want to…… but you can at least get out of the outside lane as you tootle along at 69mph.

The other major problem at the moment is the sudden bottlenecks caused by all the people happily and safely bowling along at a decent clip suddenly slowing when they see a parked up police car.

American Man Boasts Of Having Sex With A Thousand Cars

A man in Washington State, U.S.A whose name is Edward Smith lives with his current “girlfriend”, a white Volkswagen Beetle named Vanilla, and claims they enjoy a full physical relationship. He added: “I’m not sick and I don’t want to hurt anyone, cars are just my preference.”

Edwards insists he is not insane (don’t they all) and has no intention of changing his ways. He said of his unusual partner: “I appreciate beauty and I go a little bit beyond appreciating the beauty of a car only to the point of what I feel is an expression of love. Maybe I’m a bit off the wall but when I see movies like Herbie and Knight Rider, where cars become loveable, huggable characters it’s just wonderful.

Mr Smith says he is a romantic who writes love poems to his cars, sings them love songs and sends flowers on their birthdays. He also talks to them as one would a girlfriend. here we see a glimmer of hope for Edward. If he marries his car he will stop talking to it except to argue.

His last relationship with a woman was 12 years ago – and he could not bring himself to consummate it, although he did have sex with girls in his younger days.

Mr Smith, who told an interviewer for the Channel 5 documentary on “mechanaphilia.’ he has had sex with upwards of 1000 cars, first poked a Pontiac when he was 15 years old. He has never been attracted to women or men. Having kept his fetish secret for years Smith agreed to be interviewed at a mechanphiliacs convention in California (where else?)

Infidelity is a plague that can strike at even those who love inanimate objects and Ed’s lust for metal has spread beyond cars to other types of transport. He says that his most intense sexual experience to date was “making love” to the helicopter from 1980s TV hit Airwolf.

As well as his current squeeze Vanilla, he regularly spends time with other vehicles: a 1973 Opal GT, named Cinnamon, and 1993 Ford Ranger Splash, named Ginger.

He confesses however that many of the cars he has had sex with have belonged to strangers or were in car showrooms. Excuse us but isn’t that some kind of offence. I mean how can a car consent.

We wondered what headlines we might see if this craze caught on among footballers. David Beckham dumping Victortia for a Ferrari maybe? Ryan Giggs with a reliable Volkswagen? John Terry investing in a fleet of Volvos, Fords and Vauxhalls (very ordinay but to some men nubers matter), Accrington Stanley’s star player marrying a Skoda Estelle, Peter Crouch eloping with a mobile crane and Wayne Rooney exposed after paying fifty quid to spend a night with a 1976 Morris Marina?

Read full story

Question Of The Week

Not trying to step on NotBob’s toes here, it is only one question, with no right or wrong answers, just what you the punter thinks.

What is the occupation of the owner of this vehicle?

Black Porsche Cayenne.

Registration plate : T44RTS

Is it

A) a baker

or

B) a brothel keeper

Batteries Not Included

News today that a range of nine electric cars are to be given goverrnment subsidies of 25%. This will make the price of an electric car with specification equivalent to a Nissan Micra only slightly more expensive than a mid range Merc or Beemer. Yes electric cars are the Apple iMac of the roads. You pay twice as much for half as much but you get to feel smug.

And then there is the problem of range, The current generation of electric cars will, if you live in a fairly modest semi, get you to the end of the drive before they need charging.

And there are no fast charging points yet which means you have to hang about eight hours while the car charges from a 13 amp socket before continuing your journey.

We have reported previously that electric cars are not clean, they simply shift the shit from the end of your exhaust to the flue of a power station or the outfall from a nuclear plant.

One spokesman for the fraud green energy industry said electric cars will come into their own as renewables become our main source of power. Has anybody noticed how little sunshine we’ve had since October and how windless the cold days of the last two weeks were – except for the days there was a force six and the windmills had to be shut down because they would have torn themselves apart.

But that’s not all the bad news for sandal wearing tree huggers. There’s worse to come:
(a) Making a set of batteries for an electric car and scrapping or recycling the same causes more pollution than conventional fuel will in the car’s lifetime (and nastier pollution too).
(b) When you buy an electric car there a line of small print on the box. It says “batteries not included.

You will be reassured to know Fatsally will not be giving up her 2.5litre turbocharged Subaru Impreza 4 x 4 nor I my 2 litre VTEC Honda Accord any time soon. Proper cars for proper drivers.

VROOOOOOM 😀

Read news story on Electric Cars at BBC News
Nuclear Accident

Just Call Me The Waco Kid

Remember in Blazing Saddles when the drunk in cell number one comes round, introduces himself as Jim to Bart, the sheriff, then says that he used to be ‘The Waco Kid’.
He then explains that he turned to drink because everywhere he went some young punk was shouting “Go for your gun!”
Finally he turned round at the words and saw a seven year old kid waiting for him.
He turned away.
Sheriff Bart asks what happened next.
“He shot me in the ass.” replies Jim.

Well I haven’t been shot in the ass, but I have spent the last two days driving around in my new Subaru Imprezza WRX.
2.5 litres of turbo – charged muscle. MmmmMmmmm.

I feel like The Waco Kid because everywhere I have been some pimply faced youth in his clapped out 1 litre Corsa has tried to burn me off.

I had to back off on Sunday as a very young man in an original Mini was trying to keep pace, (and I wasn’t breaking the speed limit, running it in you know), but he was bouncing all over the place, even onto the other side of the road. I thought I ought to slow down before he killed himself:)