Wadley, Feb. 20

*Called Matt Watson at Sunbelt Nissan; waiting to hear back.

UPDATE: Alonzo Scott called and left a voicemail; I called him back and got his voicemail; so now we're just in a game of phone tag but he agreed to do a phone interview or set up a time for me to come talk in person and Matt Watson said I could come take some pictures of their vehicles!

*Emailed public affairs at the department of transportation regarding setting up an interview with David Friedman of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (citing Fox News story about cars communicating with each other).

UPDATE: They “respectfully declined” my interview request but sent me a news release on vehicle-to-vehicle communication technology so if nothing else I can pull from that for informational use in the story.

*Called Johnson Motor Company (Cadillac dealership); they just got a new shipment of their ELR; made an appointment for Friday morning at 10 a.m.; ask for Gary Johnson or Monty Smith.  I plan to take a camera with me and try to get some photos there as well.

Info from a story Boss sent me about Cadillac technology:

Finally, something that we may see as early as 2014 from Cadillac is hands-off adaptive cruise control, which keeps the car in the center of the lane and a safe distance from the car in front of it (Cadillac calls its version "Super Cruise"). Using data from cameras, radar and ultrasonic systems, the system responds more rapidly to traffic fluctuations than a human operator can and keeps the vehicle in its lane without any input from the driver.

*Called Mercedes Benz of Augusta; left a message with the general manager about setting up an interview.

I will continue to call dealerships around the area as needed until I get a full slate of sources. For now I'm comfortable with where I stand. I'd like my story to focus on the aspects of new features for safety, compared with new features for entertainment/luxury (i.e. Audi's blind spot detection, BMW's heated and cooled seats, Lexus premium surround sound, Subaru dual-stage airbags, Mercedes active cornering headlight system, etc. … those are coming from this LA Times story: http://www.latimes.com/business/autos/highway1/la-hy-tech.pg,0,6527460.photogallery?index=la-hy-tech-intro.jpg). That being said, I probably won't use ALL of these as examples, but those are the TYPES of things I plan to focus on in my story. So when I go to the various dealerships I'll ask about their new features and see what I come up with—I have a feeling the sales people I talk to will include both safety and luxury features in their interviews.

And, for those of you waiting with bated breath, I should have my rough draft up by Monday, final draft by Thursday's deadline.