Must-Have Car Features
Accessorize, Accessorize, Accessorize
As we spend more time commuting and more time connected to work—and everyone else in the world—on our mobile devices, our cars have become more than just a means of transport, or escape. They now act as boardroom, concert hall, tech incubator, and spa. Because of this, accessory in-car features have proliferated, often times overwhelming consumers.
In order to help negotiate this myriad of choices as you shop, we’ve put together this list of five of our favorite modern car features. You may not have heard of some of these. But remember, often times the greatest automotive accessories are the ones that you didn’t know that you needed until you experience them.
Radiant Heating: For those of us who live in climates where mornings, or entire days, can be a bit chilly, heated seats are de rigueur. But heating elements have expanded their warming. Heated steering wheels have become popular, and not just in luxury vehicles like Audis and Cadillacs; they’re also available in Fords, Subarus, and Chevrolets. Mercedes-Benz and BMW now offer heated armrests on their top-level vehicles. And Rolls-Royce has outdone all of them in their new Phantom sedan and Cullinan SUV, by offering heating elements in the rear C-pillar (that’s the upright part of the cabin behind the rear side windows) providing a warm blush for a cold cheek après ski.
Apple CarPlay/Android Auto: In car “infotainment” systems are available across the entire automotive market, offering a dizzying range of features and capabilities. But the functions they perform are often superfluous, buried in unintelligible menus, and accessed via imprecise interfaces. Fortunately, we all have in our pockets a piece of technology with which we are unerringly familiar, that can handle all of our most common communication, navigation, entertainment, and even shopping needs: our smart phones. Apple CarPlay and Android Auto mirror the apps and interface of your phone onto your car’s screen, allowing you to use it just like you use your phone. Nearly every major automaker now offers this service.
Adaptive Cruise Control: Typical cruise control holds a set speed unless you depress the brake. Adaptive cruise control (ACC) uses radar, cameras, and other sensors to maintain your desired speed as well, but it does so in relationship to the speed of the car in front of you, accelerating up toward your set velocity, but braking whenever the car in front of you slows down, all while maintaining a safe distance from that lead car. Some systems will even work in stop and go traffic, but we like ACC it best for long highway drives, where it removes the need to constantly work to maintain a consistent, appropriate speed, and thus takes away some of the mental exhaustion of this kind of trip. Again nearly every automaker now offers this service.
Rolls-Royce Starlight Headliner
Ambient Lighting: Lighting affects your mood. Driving is mood-altering enough. So why shouldn’t you be able to help adjust your emotional state while you’re in the car, especially during your evening commute, or when heading out at night. Manufacturers like Mercedes, Audi, BMW, Land Rover, Jaguar, and others offer from four to sixty-four different colors in their interior ambient lighting—strips of light that run along the edges of the dash and doors, and in the foot-wells in front of the seats. Some of these systems allow you to engage a revolving palette of colors that will fade in and out. BMW will even allow you to choose a color to light up the glass sunroof in some of its cars. But only Rolls-Royce offers the ultimate interior mood lighting option, its Starlight Headliner, which embeds hundreds of tiny pinpoints of light in the fabric that lines the interior of the car’s roof, for a magical, soothing and delightful constellation effect.
Manual Transmission: Only two percent of the new cars sold in America last year were ordered with a manual transmission, and fewer than twenty percent of the models on sale here even offer a stick shift as an option. Alfa Romeo, Audi, Buick, Cadillac, Maserati, Mercedes, and many others have zero choices for people who like to self-shift. And while manual transmissions no longer offer benefits in terms of enhanced efficiency and speed, they do save on initial cost and all-around complexity. Plus, they make the act of driving more engaging and fun, the kind of mindfulness we are often seeking. Aston Martin, BMW, Chevrolet, Dodge, Fiat, Ford, Genesis, Honda, Hyundai, Kia, Lotus, Mazda, Mitsubishi, Nissan, Porsche, Subaru, Toyota, and VW all still have manuals available here. Keep the tradition alive, or learn a new and useful skill. Try one.