If you don’t live there, you can’t possibly understand. I know it sounds like a smart ass thing to say, but it is true. SoCal car culture is a different thing that anywhere else in the country, or the world for that matter, and no matter how much gas costs or how many EV cars are sold, that’s not going to change. If you truly want to experience automotive culture at a completely different level, you need an extended visit to SoCal to understand what it is like.
When Freiburger and I worked together at CarJunkieTV in 2007 and 2008, I drove 53 miles each way to Burbank every day. And every Wednesday morning, at 7:30am, I would drive through Pasadena and see a woman that was probably in her 70’s getting on the freeway in a dark green 1970 Nova. It had steelies and dog dish caps, was a bench seat car, and looked 100% stock. It was not a show car, but a clean survivor that was clearly her only car. She had her hair covered with a scarf and I’d bet good money she was going to get her weekly hairdo. Again, I saw her EVERY Wednesday morning. And she was just one example. Old cars are prevalent there. They don’t rust. People care about old cars in SoCal. Survivors is what everyone is calling them today, and that’s a perfectly acceptable descriptive. It is so normal to see significantly older cars on the road that you don’t even think about it. And the older the community, the more of these driver cars exist.
Watch the video below to get a taste of what I’m talking about.
Video Description:
Rust-free vintage muscle cars, 1950s cars, old trucks, and interesting 1980s cars all survive on the streets of Los Angeles! In this video I’ll hunt for the best driveway finds and–dare I say it?–barn finds. You’ll see Broncos, Mopars, a T-bird, cool Ford wagons, and even a 1938 Buick. Check it out!
