Sep 28, 2009
Some Monday Fun
Anna Kruchowski
City Safety – Predicted for Year 2032
Good friend and past boss Bob Austin sent this over. While on vacation in Nova Scotia, which is an absolutely beautiful place to visit (and a short ferry ride away), Bob found a Popular Science magazine from 1952. Great article that predicted car to car crash avoidance technology would be available in 2032. Guess we beat that by a long shot with City Safety.
Good week to you all,
Dan
3 Comments
Amazing that this Popular Science writer was so forward-thinking back in 1952, a year when seatbelts weren’t even considered remotely necessary.
Regarding safety, Volvo has always always been so far ahead of the other players in this automotive game that others scramble to catch up, so perhaps other automakers will come to embrace this very important cause in the future. True to form, kudos to you for doing it today!
yes, I’m always amazed at how, being a small car company, we get such great technologies before other brands. I think it’s because of our size that from concept to implementation the cycle is very short. Like when we did side impact air bags, being the first to do it. Granted we don’t make them and we have extremely close ties to suppliers for what they are also thinking but that relationship and our ability to ‘implement’ seems to work well.
thanks for your kind words,
dan
Not too surprising that this writer was so forward thinking. The author was Hugo Gernsback who was the publisher responsible for 20th century science fiction. The biggest award in the science fiction world is the “Hugo” which is named in his honor.