Made it.
The drive east from Ohio into New York and then into Massachusetts is like driving through a calendar. The leaves are starting to turn, the rolling fields are dotted with peeling white or red paint, and air freshens up. It also has a little something that the west coast doesn't have, weather. More specifically, rain. It was another chance to try out the live radar-map some more. The big green thing on the screen tells me where the rain is. So do the rain drops on my window.
Mike Magrath, Vehicle Testing Assistant @ 5,980 miles.
ekimfeenux says:
01:57 PM, 10/ 5/08
"It also has a little something that the west coast doesn't have, weather. More specifically, rain."
You apparently don't make it up to Seattle very often...
It was like a monsoon ripped through yesterday.
felonious says:
02:09 PM, 10/ 5/08
That's a good point. Also, I'd never thought much of real-time weather until now.
spencerkatz says:
03:22 PM, 10/ 5/08
magrath u hardwired ur v1 and a concealed display all for one road trip? seems like a lot of work for a car that isnt urs
tinyelvis says:
05:04 PM, 10/ 5/08
Hmm... this is now looking awfully suspicious.
A "friend" is having some kind of "gathering" right when the Red Sox are playing in the postseason at the "yahd."
As long as you're there, don't forget to have a bowl of Legal Sea Foods Chowdah in Fenway. It's the best.
70ss454_man says:
08:50 PM, 10/ 5/08
I agree with ekimfeenux
Spend some time in the northern, western, and southern part of Washington, and the northern and western part of Oregon
It's been raining non stop where I live in Vancouver, Washington for the past week.
Makes for some good 4-wheelin though!
Also, the dash in this picture looks to be of very high quality and well put together
I'm impressed
mikeolan says:
09:20 PM, 10/ 5/08
What an incredibly useful feature, and I bet people with a Flex with this service wonder how they ever lived without it. I never saw the point of things like an outside temperature indicator until you wonder if a road could ice over.
bimmerjay says:
11:55 PM, 10/ 5/08
"I never saw the point of things like an outside temperature indicator until you wonder if a road could ice over."
...unless you live in an area with micro-climates (California) or travel through varied geography. A trip to Tahoe can take you from 80F in the central valley to 20F by the time you get into the mountains.
carmizvi says:
10:14 AM, 10/ 6/08
Thanks for sharing the bit about real-time weather. Like basic GPS, I suspect it'll eventually become a mainstream must-have feature for any screen - portable or built-in - that goes into a car.
I often drive the 401 through southern and eastern Ontario, and before every road trip, I check the weather forecasts and then continue to track them on my BlackBerry when I take breaks. But how cool it would be to have the real-time maps integrated into my route.
Genius, especially in regions where the weather can change on a dime and stop-detour-press-on decisions need this granularity of information.
I'd like to see this on every car lickety split.
rick8365 says:
11:41 AM, 10/ 6/08
As someone who is borderline addicted to radar / satellite views available online.....I'm afraid this option would only make my condition worse.
Very cool.
sellaturcica says:
03:56 PM, 10/ 6/08
I've gone storm chasing with some buddies of mine the last 3 years. I'm more of the photographer, they're really into the weather forecasting aspect, but they got this tech for my friend's laptop when I started going with them. According to them, completely changed the dynamics of the hobby- you can see where the precipitation is, hail and where the doppler thinks the storm is rotating, and you get south of all that. I can count the number of times we've really been rained on the times I've gone. Has to be much safer than before. This kind of tech may be why there are traffic jams in the middle of fields in Kansas and Oklahoma on chase days, everybody and their brother is out looking at the storms...