Heyward Allen Toyota

How many bad drivers can you spot every day on your drive to work? Five? Ten? All of them? We feel your pain, and apparently the alarming truth is that one-in-five motorists - which, for those interesting in the gory details, equals roughly 38 million Americans - are unfit to drive on our nation's highways.

This data is according to a test administered by GMAC Insurance that asked motorists 20 questions taken straight from your local DMV's written driving test. About 20 percent of currently licensed drivers would have failed the test, and the average score of 76.2 percent is down slightly from that of 2009.

Some interesting factoids: Male drivers scored better than females on both average scores (78.1 percent male versus 74.4 percent female) and failure rates (24 percent female versus 18.1 percent male). New Yorkers ranked dead last (70 percent average score) and Kansas drivers ranked highest (82.3 percent average score). Want to know more? (Perhaps not...). If so, click here for a further breakdown from our friends at TheDetroitBureau.com.

When it's time to buy a new car and desperation comes calling, all other priorities peel away, leaving price alone to govern the decision. But simply buying the cheapest car isn't necessarily the cheapest route. Cars-even the affordable ones-are expensive to own and operate. So Car and Driver went in search of the answer to an important question: What is the cheapest car to buy and own? Fuel is an obvious consideration, but insurance can't be ignored, either.



The Toyota Yaris is often cited as an example of why the Smart ForTwo needn't exist. About $1000 more expensive, it feels and looks more like a real car, it has more cargo space, and it won't hang your buddies out to dry if you occasionally need to accommodate more than one passenger. Even so, the Yaris is as devoid of driving pleasure as the Smart, although its center-mounted instrument panel adds driving excitement by taking the driver's eyes off the road whenever he wants to know how fast he's going. So there's that.

During the late '80s and early '90s, American buyers were stuck with the over-regulated, hollowed-out versions of hot metal available in Japan and Europe. While our friends across the Pacific were busy driving things with SiR and GT-R badges, we had to be content to import parts and spin our own wrenches just to get a fraction of the performance available to buyers straight from the factory outside of the States. One of the few companies to actually throw us yanks a bone was, believe it or not, Toyota. Before the company resorted to selling the automotive equivalent of bran flakes, you could find legendary cars like the Supra and Celica All-Trac lurking in the dark corners of U.S. dealer lots.

Thanks to Vin Diesel and Paul Walker's silver screen exploits, every Pep Boys parking lot knows about the Supra, but the Celica All-Trac remains far less celebrated - and far more rare. By the fifth generation, the car couldn't have been any more different from its plebian brethren. The All-Trac abandoned its native front-wheel drive for a sophisticated all-wheel drive system born on the rally stages of the world, and a turbocharged 2.0-liter four-cylinder that produced a lofty 200 horsepower and 200 lb-ft of torque - big numbers considering the Ford Mustang GT of the day managed a measly 220 horsepower.

Needless to say, these puppies are rare, and it's nearly impossible to find one that hasn't been ran hard and put away wet. That makes this particular eBay find beyond special. A one-owner, 1993 Toyota Celica All-Trac with a scant 40,500 miles, it's as cherry as cherry can be. You can find it in Marietta, Georgia with three days left on the clock and a reserve not yet met with the bidding at $8,670 as of publish time. Check the full listing here.

Daimler began developing fuel-cell vehicles way back in 1994. To date, the company has spent $1.23 billion on the propulsion technology. Toyota entered into the hydrogen realm even earlier by kicking off development back in 1992. With decades of combined experience, both companies have become front runners in fuel-cell technology. Toyota and Honda became the first automakers to put commercial hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles on the roads back in 2002.

As you are likely aware, Toyota has teamed up with Tesla for development of electric vehicles at NUMMI. Now, a new report suggests that the company may join forces with Daimler (which also holds stake in Tesla) to develop affordable hydrogen-powered vehicles.

According to the Financial Times Deutschland (as reported in Reuters), Toyota and Daimler plan "extensive cooperation in the field of fuel cells for electric cars." The Financial Times also suggests that the collaborative work could take the form of a joint venture. The newspaper contacted both companies for official confirmation, but Toyota denied knowledge of any such deal and Daimler was not available for comment.

Last year, some of the major players in fuel cell technology agreed to work together to promote the adoption of the hydrogen-powered vehicle. Within that group, we saw names like Daimler, Toyota, General Motors, Ford, Honda, Nissan and Hyundai. With so many companies pledging to combine their might on fuel-cell vehicle development, we assumed that some sort of joint venture would emerge. Tim Urquhart, an analyst at IHS Global Insight suggests that a Toyota-Daimler joint venture could benefit both companies. As Urquhart said:

The high development costs associated with trying to bring fuel-cell powertrain technology to production means that it is a highly logical step for Daimler and Toyota to try and share the costs and their extensive knowledge in fuel-cell technology.

We all know that Toyota vehicles are durable, strong and last forever, especially the trucks. But just how durable are they? Do they live forever? Can they actually be killed? Will you still be driving a Tacoma after the bombs fall? :0)

Watch below and see for yourself just HOW durable a Toyota Truck really is. You think you're rough on your truck? Try this out!

This concept is a little, ah, tricky to explain, so bear with me.

You know that comfy La-Z-Boy you have in your living room?  Imagine if it had three wheels, joysticks in both armrests that allowed you to steer right or left, a plug-in electric motor that would propel you on the sidewalks at walking-jogging speed and then gear up to speeds of up to 20 miles per hour on the streets, perimeter monitoring sensors that would alert you to other vehicles or pedestrians who might stray into your path, a wireless Internet connection, and an LED screen on the back of the chair that can both serve as a set of turn signals/brake lights and display the message of your choice to the rest of the world.

What I'm describing is a Toyota i-REAL, a concept that the automaker describes as a "personal mobility vehicle," a single-person conveyance designed for trips that are just a little too far for walking, but close enough that driving there in your conventional car seems excessive.

Watch the video below from the UK's Top Gear for an up close look at the iReal:

If you've ever wondered what Toyota's engineers do in their spare time...well...just watch for yourself!

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety has just announced that a total of three new Toyota vehicles have been given Top Safety Pick awards. Both the 2011 Toyota Avalon and 2011 Toyota Sienna were awarded the institute's highest ratings in front, side, rollover and rear crash tests. The 2010 Lexus RX also nabbed a Top Safety Pick nod. All of the vehicles come with electronic stability control as standard equipment - another parameter for receiving the award.

Toyota's Sienna earns the honor of being the first minivan to receive the Top Safety Pick since the IIHS added rollover data to its list of crash criteria in 2010.

If there is any truth to this report from Road & Track, you inexpensive sports car lovers are going to owe the Toyota FT-86 a lot of thanks. RT says that the development costs for Toyota's re-entry into the truly sporty segment has run over estimates and the car is going to be priced higher than $20,000 - not what Toyota wanted.

In response, the Japanese automaker has allegedly decided to bring out another, less expensive front-engined, rear-wheel-drive car using the 109-horsepower engine from the first generation Scion xB and getting in under the $20K limbo bar. If this dream does come true, you'll be able to open your eyes in 2012, a year after the FT-86 arrives.

California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda held a joint press in Palo Alto, California to announce that the two companies would be collaborating on electric vehicle development and production, with Tesla will taking over the recently closed NUMMI factory in Fremont, CA to produce the Model S sedan.

Toyota will invest $50 million for a private placement of Tesla common stock and the state of California will provide a sales tax abatement to Tesla for capital equipment expenditures to tool up the plant. Musk estimated that the abatement will amount to about $20 million over the next several years.

According to Musk, production of the Model S will bring about 1,000 employees back to the NUMMI plant to produce about 20,000 cars a year at first, and as the facility expands - possibly to include the production of more models - it could employ up to 10,000 workers. Musk revealed that some employees have already been rehired, but was non-committal on the subject of union representation. NUMMI was the only Toyota plant in North America that was unionized.

An additional benefit to Tesla from this deal is that it will be able to take advantage of the Toyota production system and possibly some of Toyota's suppliers. That's sure to help Tesla avoid many of the logistical problems that hampered early Roadster production and costs.

Production of the Model S is still planned to start in 2012 and Musk said more advanced prototypes would be revealed later this year. No decisions have been made yet about additional vehicles to be produced at the plant which previously had a capacity of more than 300,000 vehicles a year.