Trends in Transportation - Hydrogen and Fuel Cells: Advances in Transportation and Power - page 149

at female consumers while the jet fighter imagery of the exterior was
designed to have a masculine appeal.
The postwar economic boom brought the automobile within the reach
of more people than ever before but the American automobile culture was
attacked in the late 1950s by Vance Packard and in 1965 by Ralph Nader
in a topic called Unsafe at any Speed. Growing safety concerns led to the
passing of the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act in 1968.
The mid-1950s saw the appearance of American sports cars, such
as the Corvette and the Thunderbird. In the 1930s young men started
to build and race their own hot rods or custom cars. This eventually led
to the advent of muscle cars and pony cars. They lasted for less than a
decade, but the muscle cars were powerful and fast. The first muscle car
was the Pontiac GTO followed by the Firebird, Trans Am and Camaro. The
Ford Mustang of 1964 was the first pony car. Other muscle and pony cars
followed, such as the Dodge Charger and the Chrysler Barracuda. By the
early 1970s muscle and pony cars had become bigger and heavier.
The oil crisis and the rising environmental movement of the early
1970s stopped the growth of these gas-guzzlers. To some the car ceased
to express the good life and began to become a threat to the future of
society.
The Jeep and its variations were a part of the American scene from
the mid-1940s. It retained its identity as a utility vehicle for the consumer
market and in 1974 the Cherokee appeared as the first of the sports utility
vehicles (SUVs). Another utility vehicle that reached international status
was the British Land Rover. The original Land Rover was a basic vehicle
with no thought to physical comforts. In 1970, Rover combined the
utility of the Land Rover in rough terrain with the comfort and luxury
of its sedans. The result was the Range Rover, which was produced until
1995.
Both the American Jeep and the British Land Rover were highly
successful with consumers. They symbolized a working society that used
material goods as tools. In rural and urban areas, these utility vehicles
could serve several purposes. But, by the end of the century this concept
seemed to be largely symbolic. This type of vehicle was widely emulated in
the 1980s and 1990s as the concept of the sports utility vehicle grew quickly
and was produced by manufacturers around the world. In the late 1980s
Chrysler converted the Jeep into an urban car. Japanese manufacturers
followed the SUV concept with the Toyota Landcruiser, Isuzu Trooper and
other high-off-the-ground, four-wheel-drive, large-wheeled vehicles.