On Labor Day I drove by the local Toyota dealership and noticed there was no special sale signs out front. In fact it looked quite and business as usual for any Monday. So I decided to wait until Tuesday to stop by and talk to their sales people.

So on Tuesday when I drove into my local Toyota dealer, I was some what taken by the space between the cars. The outside row of cars that lined both the main and side street were close together. Further inside the lot were blotches of cars with 30 or 40 feet between them.

I drove up to the visitor parking area and got out of my Dodge mini van. It was not more than three minutes before a tall fit mid 30′s salesman walked up to me with his hand out to shake my hand. He introduced himself as Cliff.

In the past week every other car commercial on the television has been about the Toyota Venza. Talk about media blitz. I am starting to dream Toyota Venza. Okay Toyota, I got your message. I am going to take a hard look at the Venza, this week.

The Toyota Venza is a midsize crossover SUV based on the Toyota Camry. It was first released in the 2009 model year. The Venza was originally classified as a SUV. When I look at it, I seen a large mid size car or a station wagon. I do not see a SUV.

The Venza has four trims they are distinguished between the size of the engine and the number of wheels used to move the car along the road. The front with drive model comes in either a 4 cylinder or 6 cylinder. The all wheel model alternates between the same two engine sizes.

The term minivan to be use in North America in 1984. It was termed by by Toyota and Chrysler when they launched their respective smaller than normal size vans. Minivan came to refer to small box shape van than was used by soccer moms to transport family and groceries.

Over the past several years the true minivan (Dodge Caravan i.e.) has gotten bigger. Now many of those vans who started out as true minivans are equal to or just smaller than a full size van.

I am personally holding on to my 1998 Dodge Caravan until next year. We owe no money on it. However, we are not getting the kind of gas mileage newer vehicles are getting. Dodge is only producing the full size van. So we are looking around at other vehicles.

Gas prices have been on the rise, forcing people to take a hard look at alternate ways to get from point A to point B. Some people have gone to public transportation. Others are choosing to ride bicycles. Then there are people heading to the car dealerships to consider the number of electric power cars. In the past year we have seen almost every car manufacture come out with at least one car totally powered by electricity or assisted by electricity.

There has been quite a number cars that have hit the dealership floors either partially or entirely that are powered by electric batteries. I figured it is time for us to take a hard look at a few of the electric cars. I hate to see any of you buying something that you end up regretting. 

It has been just over a year ago, I wrote a Auto Recon for the Toyota Tacoma. The reason why I am looking a it again is because the Tacoma is rated in the top 10 of pick up trucks.

The Toyota Tacoma does not come in one trim for a weekend hauling/camping. When I visited clicked on the Tacoma website I noticed four sizes with similar body styles. Toyota labels each size as Regular Cab, Access Cab, Double Cab, and X Runner.

Don’t worry, the difference is more than cab size between each trim. The wheel base ranges from a modest 109.8″ for the Regular Cab to 127.4 for the other three trims. I thought it was interesting the payload capacity on the Regular Cab is 1350, the Access Cab is 1510, Double Cab is 1430, and the X Runner only carries 895 pounds. The biggest trim of the Tacoma model load capacity is the least.

Did you know that Chrysler had a recall for engine stalling? Did you know Ford had a recalls for fuel leaks and electrical shorts? Well, we have been so absorbed with the events in the Middle East and Japan these recalls have gone unnoticed.

Most auto recalls rarely hit the Today Show’s news desk unless it happens to be a slow news day. The same goes for the local new as well as the local paper. Then where should we find out the recalls?

On Wednesday, I usually focus on shopping for cars, truck and any other motor vehicle that is driven on public streets. In those post I devote a few sentence to a paragraph to recalls. Why recalls?

It was just over a couple of months ago that I wrote about the Chevy Cruze. Since then the Chevy Cruze, Ford Focus along with other electric cars have been getting a lot of attention. For the last 20 or so years your basic car has not change much. In the last couple of year we are seeing a radical change in the cars themselves.

The Chevy was born in 1911 with founder Louis Chevrolet and General Motor founder William C. Durant. In 1917, The Chevy car company became part of General Motor. The Chevrolet car was to go up against Henry Ford’s Model T. It has been that way for a 100 years.

This has been a rough year for the Toyota motor company. During the first part of 2010 news came out about how Toyota had covered an accelerator problem with the Prius. Just a few month ago Toyota recalled a long list of cars because of brake fluid issues. Still I am seeing quite a few Toyota’s on the road.

I am not hearing of any major issues with the Toyota brand in the news. However, Automotive.com does list a very large number of makes and models that have been recalled this year.

At the start of 2010 The Huffington Post report there was a recalls for gas pedals sticking. The Toyota Prius was not in this list. There was quite a large number of other models on the list.

This week we are going to take a look at what is classified as a luxury car. I don’t want to be in the rut of just looking at inexpensive vehicles. This week we are going to look at a higher end station wagon or crossover; the Lexus RX.

If you don’t know already, it helps to be aware that Lexus is a division of Toyota car company.

The Lexus RX model first hit the streets in 1999. The Lexus RX 300 became a pioneer in what is now known as Crossover vehicles. This is the blending of attributes of a truck and a passenger car.

This is the day before Christmas. Many of us are looking for a fuel efficient, green car in our future. The Toyota Prius is to the 2009 what the Toyota Corolla was to the late 1960′s and 1970′s. Both cars are break through cars of their day. That is way the Toyota Corolla is still in production, with a new changes over the years.

The Toyota Prius has become the standard for automakers when it comes to gasoline/electric hybrid vehicles. The popularity and sales history makes the Toyota’s first hybrid car very popular. Having the Prius do a cameo appearance on The Closer does not hurt its’ reputation.