In 1959 Fidel Castro banned the importation and sale of US-made vehicles in Cuba. Cuba had actually been a lucrative market for American automakers–selling tens of thousands of vehicles a year prior to the ban–with some models and features “tested” in the Cuban market before mass-produced in the US. No longer able to purchase the vehicles they wanted because of government intervention, Cubans were faced with some tough decisions: continue to drive their American cars until the wheels fell off, switch to the junky cars built by Cuba’s allies in the Soviet Union, or (the real goal of socialism) become more dependent on the government for another basic need–being able to just get around.
A surprising number of Cubans chose the first option–keeping the car they wanted and driving it for as long as they could. And so they drove it, and drove it, and drove it, and drove it, and drove it–to the point that now, more than 60-years later, an estimated 60,000 pre-1959 American-made automobiles are still on the roads in Cuba. Visitors describe the scene as seeing an auto museum come to life. Families that owned the cars in the days before the revolution have passed them down from generation to generation–and they are their most-prized possessions.
Castro’s ban also included the importation of parts for American vehicles, so the owners of the classics have had to use some pretty unique techniques to keep them running. Parts have been scavenged off of other models still on the island, “backwoods engineering” has allowed mechanics to fit parts from the aforementioned Soviet rolling dumpsters into Detroit drivetrains, and some have had full switch outs, going to diesel engines, since that is far easier to procure in Cuba than regular gas.
I thought of those Cuban cars last week when the Biden administration ann0unced new standards for fleet fuel efficiency requirements for American automakers. Barring some great leap forward in engine technology, GM, Ford and Chrysler-Fiat will be forced to make smaller and less-powerful vehicles to comply with the new standards–leaving those that want larger, more-powerful vehicles with few, if any, options. And so we will become like the Cubans of the early 1960’s–faced with the decision of holding on to the cars and trucks with the performance we want–or do conforming to what the Government wants us to drive?
I turn 50 later this year, which means I have an estimated 30 to 35 years of driving still ahead of me. It is possible that within the next 5 to 10 years new vehicles will not be produced with the standards that I want: acceptable horsepower, interior space, hauling capacity, the cold-weather performance of a gas-powered internal combustion engine, on-demand four-wheel drive, and a manual transmission. I have to face the real possibility that the next (used) vehicle that I buy may be the last vehicle I will want to buy for the rest of my life.
CAFE standards, and outright bans on gas-powered vehicles (like the one going into place in California in a few years) will force US automakers to abandon internal combustion engines, and requirements to have emergency braking systems on all vehicles will kill the manual transmission–as the two systems do not work well together.
So just like in Cuba, Americans will hang onto the vehicles that they want–and the roadways of the future will become a hodge-podge of small electric vehicles traveling slowly in the right lanes on their short journeys, gas-powered relics blowing by them in the left lane towing boats to summer cottages, and the majority of people crammed into buses and light rail cars looking longingly at those in their personal vehicles getting to drive wherever they want whenever they want by themselves.
Those of us that take our vehicles to mechanics will have to become gearheads ourselves, using black market parts or anything we can scrounge up to keep our rare machines running. The internet will be full of schematics to help us understand the drivetrain systems and chips from computers and cellphones will be reprogrammed to keep 2000’s era vehicles running. This is all assuming, of course, that those in Government frustrated by lack of compliance don’t just issue all-out bans on personal vehicle ownership, to save the planet, you know.
My retirement gift to myself will be a 1967 Pontiac GTO convertible with a 360-horsepower, 400-cubic inch big-block V8 engine and a four-speed manual transmission. I used to think that it would be a nice “Sunday car” to compliment the two-door Jeep Rubicon Wrangler with the six-speed tranny that would be my “everyday driver”. But now I think what would then be a 70-year old vehicle may have to be the only option.
And if there is a ban on internal combustion engines by that point. At least I know I’ll be able to outrun any enforcement vehicle on the road. “A Nice Morning Drive[1]“, written by Richard Foster and published in the November 1973 issue of Road & Track magazine.
