Car Culture

NewSpeak From Detroit: GMC Pitches “Tool For Urban Living”

In a turn of phrase straight out of "1984," Detroit is touting a new concept car as a "tool for urban living."

By Noah Kazis

12:47 PM EST on January 12, 2010

Nothing represents city life like a miniaturized SUV. Image: NYT

In a turn of phrase straight out of “1984,” Detroit is touting a new concept car as a “tool for urban living.”

At this week’s Detroit auto show, the industry’s premier showcase, GMC revealed its Granite concept car. The truck and SUV manufacturer, which owes its very existence to government largesse, put forward this subcompact-sized car styled as a full-size SUV as a way to rebrand itself as modern and urban.

GMC seems to equate “urban living” with “parallel parking” — the Granite would be two feet shorter than GMC’s next-smallest vehicle. It’s no Yukon XL, but the basic big truck aesthetic with its boxy shape and monster grille remains unchanged.

Imagine walking across the street in front of this thing. Imagine being a third-grader walking to school in front of it. Would you even be able to make eye contact with the driver? Not that you’re likely to find out, as “production is a long shot,” according to Wheels.

Sadly, New York City once used GMC buses — real tools for urban living — as part of its transit fleet. The division also sells a brand of bike, each creepily named after one of its SUVs.

Noah Kazis

Noah joined Streetsblog as a New York City reporter at the start of 2010. When he was a kid, he collected subway paraphernalia in a Vignelli-map shoebox. Before coming to Streetsblog, he blogged at TheCityFix DC and worked as a field organizer for the Obama campaign in Toledo, Ohio. Noah graduated from Yale University, where he wrote his senior thesis on the class politics of transportation reform in New York City. He lives in Morningside Heights.

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