Pleasant Ridge’s NextCruise promotes environmentally friendly vehicles

By Jeremy Selweski
C & G Staff Writer

PLEASANT RIDGE — Those looking for a middle ground between the Woodward Dream Cruise and the Ferndale Green Cruise this year may find the perfect answer lurking in Pleasant Ridge’s Memorial Park.

Titled NextCruise, the new event combines the Dream Cruise’s celebration of automobile culture with its “green” counterpart’s promotion of environmentally friendly lifestyles.

Held concurrently with the Dream Cruise on August 16, NextCruise is designed as a forward-looking affair that will provide the public with multiple opportunities to check out the latest in green cars, trucks and crossover vehicles from nine of the world’s largest automakers, including General Motors, Ford, Chrysler, Volkswagen and BMW.

With a motto of “lean, mean and green,” NextCruise aims to help expand the relevance of the Dream Cruise “from a single-minded retrospective into a celebration of the automobile’s past, present and future.”

“We certainly have a lot of respect for the Dream Cruise and the Green Cruise, but we want to bridge that gap,” said Paul Eisenstein, chairman of the NextCruise Committee and a longtime automotive journalist. “We want to reach people who care about the environment but still love automobiles.”

Added Pleasant Ridge City Commissioner George Lenko, “The timing for this is very very right with where we are with gas prices and global warming. Every year, there’s always a sub-story about the Dream Cruise being a gas-guzzling traffic jam. We wanted to take a fresh approach to that.”

An idea that had been percolating in Lenko’s mind for the past two or three years, NextCruise began to take shape once Lenko pitched the concept Eisenstein, whose automotive knowledge and extensive connections within the industry proved invaluable to getting it off the ground.

At NextCruise, the automakers on hand will display a number of vehicles that incorporate clean diesel engines, electric motors, fuel cells and hybrid powertrain systems. Featured vehicles include the Jeep Cherokee Diesel and the BMW Hydrogen 7, which utilizes a hydrogen-powered engine.

NextCruise will take a look at the future generation of green motor sports, including the ethanol-fueled IndyCar Series and the American Le Mans Series, which will feature a “Green Racing Challenge” this season.

Eisenstein pointed out that a key component of the event is to make people aware of the enormous variety of alternative-fuel vehicles out there, vehicles that boast high gas mileage and low emissions.

“It’s clear that there is no silver bullet to the challenge of finding the perfect environmentally friendly automobile,” he said. “Therefore, it will take a variety of solutions for tomorrow’s future.”

For Lenko, the NextCruise also brings up an important point about cruising culture that often gets overlooked. “The original cruisers were showing off the hottest new technologies of their day,” he said. “It was about looking forward with creativity in engineering.”

Another main idea of the event is its interactive, hands-on nature. Featuring a number of “ride and drives,” NextCruise allows attendees to not only view the vehicles on hand, but also to actually get behind the wheel and take them for a test drive.

“I think it will be a big draw to the general public,” Lenko said. “People don’t have a sense of technology by just looking at it. Only by experiencing it will people get on board.”

And Eisenstein believes that judging by how far green technology has come, people will, in fact, get on board with this new concept soon enough.

“The old green machines were smelly, sluggish and not all that fun to drive, but the newer ones are providing a blend of all the things that drivers want,” he said. “They meet the toughest emission standards and have amazing fuel efficiency. But they’re also quick as bunnies, which can appeal to muscle car fans.”

Lenko is excited to kick off the NextCruise as a way to showcase the “cutting-edge, environmentally friendly, open-minded” attitude of the city of Pleasant Ridge. He believes it will also point the way for people who may have become jaded by the current state of car manufacturing.

“There is a lot of life left in the auto industry,” he said. “There’s a lot to still be impressed about. The ‘60s and ‘70s may not have been our glory days. It may be that our glory days are still ahead of us.”

Pleasant Ridge’s inaugural NextCruise will be held all day on August 16 in Memorial Park, just south of I-696 on the west side of Woodward Avenue. In addition to the car displays, it will also feature food, live music and a movie screening after dark. There will also be a public preview of the event on August 15 from 6 to 9 p.m. For more information, visit www.next cruise2008.com.

You can reach Staff Writer Jeremy Selweski at jselweski@candgnews.com or at (586) 218-5004.