Gas is out, electricity is in! m-way sells all you need to move on two or four wheels exclusively powered by electricity. Cars, motorcycles, scooters and bikes are available with their accessories, useful advices and related services, including assistance and maintenance. A test drive will help you find which e-vehicle fits your needs. Visit their online shop or the stores in Geneva and Lausanne. m-way, a Migros company, is expanding in Switzerland; check their website for more locations.
Geneva Motor Show 2011 by Mr Kio, www.facebook.com/IdefixPhotography
BASEL / GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Three of western Switzerland’s biggest commercial fairs open Thursday 8 March to Saturday, the watch show in Basel, the car show in Geneva, with each expected to pull in tens of thousands of visitors, and Habitat & Jardin, a favourite with apartment dwellers but especially homeowners and wannabes.
The Lausanne show, which attracts 100,000 people, starts in Lausanne Saturday 10 March and the best deal in town is a CFF rail ticket with travel and entry reductions.
This is definitely not a weekend to complain there is nothing to do!
Geneva Motor Show 2012, smaller cars but enough glamour for a quick fix
Lamborghini and Ferrari are putting their fancy wares on display, as usual, for this show that opens the car year in Europe.
Lamborghini’s not-so-subtle press release notes that the company “is presenting the most uncompromising open super sports car of its entire history. The Lamborghini Aventador J is a force of nature on wheels — supremely powerful and supremely open. The Aventador J offers its pilot and co-pilot an utterly indescribable experience of power and dynamics. At the same time, the 515 kW / 700 hp two-seater is a first class technology showcase.”
Ferrari is unveiling its 599 GTB Fiorano replacement, the F12berlinetta.
Geneva Motor Show 2011 by Mr Kio, www.facebook.com/IdefixPhotography
For the more conservative, electric cars are looking increasingly mainstream, with General Motors’s two extended range electrics, Chevrolet Volt and Opel Ampera, jointly named car of the year.
Here’s what world auto industry media are saying about this year’s show as it opens:
“European crisis sheds light on automakers’ excess capacity”, Detroit Free Press“More bad news for midprice carmakers in Europe”, NY Times
“Sexy cars at the Geneva Motor Show”, CBS News Money Watch
“Volkswagen creates more oddball Up! concepts for Geneva show”, Motor Show.
Of course, some people go to see the hostesses (sneak preview in a series of photos by Philippe Tabouriech).
Details on visiting the show are available in English at the Geneva Motor Show site. Hours are 10:00-20:00 Monday to Friday and 09:00-19:00 Saturday and Sunday. Tickets: CHF9 for children to CHF16 for adults. Public transport options are excellent, so while you might have cars on the brain, take the train.
BaselWorld celebrates 40 years with a record watch year for Swiss industry
BaselWorld attracts 100,000 people; it runs from 8 to 15 March and features not just watches but luxury jewelry. This is the 40th year of the fair, with 1,800 exhibitors. The fair kicked off with a statement that 2011 was a record year for the Swiss watch industry “with 30 million
watches exported. Turnover increased by 19.2 percent to CHF 19.3 billion,” announced Jacques Duchêne, president of the exhibitors’ committee, with Asia as “a driving force in the growth of the luxury goods industry. More than half of the exports of the Swiss watch industry are to the Far East.”
Migros has been making a push to encourage electric cars on the Swiss market
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – A 200m2 Migros m-way store opens at rue de Lausanne 54 in Geneva today, near the Cornavin station, in the same historic registered building that houses the Brazilian Mission.
It’s the first electric mobility shop for Migros in French-speaking Switzerland, and to make sure the public beats a path to it the store is offering 25 percent off on everything except cars to customers who spend CHF1,000 or more.
M-way is the public face of Migros’s push to encourage green energy and the shop sells electric scooters, bikes but also electric cars and home charging stations plus all the other accoutrements of a life that includes electric vehicles.
Summer, Grimsel Pass, Alpmobil partnering with Migros for silent, less polluting electric cars
The company is extending its programme of charging stations, and it’s been active in working with Alpine resorts to introduce fleets of electric cars for tourists, to reduce pollution in the mountains.
Nihon Kotsu, which runs the largest fleet of taxis in Tokyo, Japan, is to add three or four electric vehicles to its fleet in January to test the battery switching techniques developed by Better Place, a US “provider of electrical vehicle services” that has developed a concept where subscribers pull into switching stations and speedily exchange their batteries for fully-charged ones. The taxi company, which gives its call-in customers a choice of yellow or black taxis, will deploy the electric vehicles in January. Electric-only vehicles are limited in their range and their batteries must then be recharged for several hours at a time. Romandie News
The Chinese government is making a push to have the country become the world leader in hybrid and all-electric vehicles within three years, reports the New York Times. “China’s intention, in addition to creating a world-leading industry that will produce jobs and exports, is to reduce urban pollution and decrease its dependence on oil,” says the US newspaper, which adds that given China’s dependence on coal for electricity, lowering pollution levels won’t happen easily.
Geneva, Switzerland (Genevalunch) - The Geneva Motor Show has come and gone, but it leaves in its wake a sense that environmentally friendly “green” cars finally matter to manufacturers.
An equal amount of spectator buzz surrounded the less glamorous green cars’ stands as the flashy Ferrari and Lamborghini displays. Many of the manufacturers used g/km CO2 emissions ratios (grams of carbon dioxide per kilometre driven) as their key advertising strategy, splashing the information across the hoods, doors, and roofs of their cars.
