MOTOR BRIEFS
Volvo will restrict all its cars to 180km/h
Swedish carmaker wants to cut down on speeding crashes
Swedish premium brand Volvo has stunned the Geneva motor show without even showing up, simply by announcing it would impose a 180km/h speed limit on all its cars by 2020. Germany’s carmakers agreed long ago to a voluntary limit of 250km/h, though this can often be raised with better tyres and other tweaks to 260km/h, 280km/h or even beyond 300km/h. Volvo’s own XC90 SUV has a claimed top speed of 212km/h. Yet no country in the world bar Germany and parts of Australia’s Northern Territory allows drivers to travel at 180km/h, which poses the question of how Volvo arrived at its speed limit. “We want to start a conversation about whether carmakers have the right or maybe even an obligation to install technology in cars that changes their driver’s behaviour, to tackle things like speeding, intoxication or distraction,” said Volvo Cars CEO Håkan Samuelsson. “We don’t have a firm answer to this question, but believe we should take leadership in the discussion and be a pioneer.” Samuelsson’...
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