The French government said it would lower the speed limit on two-lane highways to 80 kilometres per hour from 90 kilometres (55 miles) per hour, hoping to reverse an alarming rise in road deaths in recent years.
While not everyone is sold on the idea of driverless cars, their development and eventual arrival in the hands of consumers continues apace. And while driving enthusiasts may not want to relinquish their driving duties to a computer, it's not hard to see the benefits of autonomous vehicles for taxi and ride-sharing operations. So it makes complete sense that ride-hailing company Lyft Inc. and self-driving software company Aptiv Plc will be showing off a fully-automated ride-hailing service at the upcoming Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas later this month.
Electric or hybrid vehicles accounted for more than half of all new cars sold in Norway last year, confirming the country's pioneering role in carbon-free transport.
If you're not yet convinced about the positives of driverless vehicle technology, you're probably going to be even more skeptical about the latest research Nissan has just revealed details of. That's because the Japanese auto giant has announced it's having success with developing technology that will enable vehicles to be controlled by interpreting signals from the driver's brain, which really would revolutionize how we interact with our cars.
2018 will likely see a notable shift in the global auto industry: while vehicles inevitably move towards greater electrification, there might also be an even bigger revolution on the way, not in terms of what vehicles we buy, but how we buy them.
In 2018 the competition between pickup manufacturers is going to become fiercer than ever as Ford, General Motors and Fiat-Chrysler go head-to-head with new strategies for their truck ranges.
Mini has long been at the forefront of making it possible for customers to customise their new cars straight from the factory, but now the manufacturer is taking things to an entirely new level with the launch of Mini Yours Customised, allowing customers to transform their car into a uniquely personalised special edition.
The South Korean automaker has teamed up with Silicon Valley-based SoundHound Inc. to develop its "Intelligent Personal Agent," a voice-enabled virtual assistant system.
It's difficult for vehicle manufacturers to react as quickly as they might like to changing trends and demographics as vehicles take such a long time to develop and bring to market. But it seems Peugeot is ahead of the curve right now when it comes to the family-friendly credentials of its all-new 5008 SUV. And it's because the new 5008 is one of the only vehicles of its type to cater for the growing size of families in the UK by having three ISOFIX anchor points for child seats across the second-row seats.
It was only ever going to be a matter of time before China stopped being almost exclusively an importer of vehicles from Europe and the USA, and instead started exporting its own models to those lucrative markets. And after a decade spent developing models through buying and studying foreign technology, Chinese automakers such as Geely are now getting close to realizing their ambition of competing in the lucrative American and European markets with their own products.
