Many older “future cars” fall under the loose category of “Xanadu: Home of The Future”. They were filled with wacky ideas that just never panned out but seemed like a sure bet while “looking forward”. Then there are others that not only got it right, they got it right with a kind of freaky crystal ball accuracy it is hard to believe. The machine below, the 1987 Pontiac Pursuit prototype has a load of ideas and concepts that not only came to fruition but are major parts of the motoring culture today.
Watch this video and for starters we can see a lot of the GM EV1 shape and the later shape of early Saturn cars in this Pursuit. The use of “drive by wire” electric steering, the use of four wheel steering, the yoke style wheel (hello, Tesla) with loads of integrated gauges, all the nicely animated digital gauges, and the integration of GPS although not called GPS is pretty wild for 1987. As we all know, the “Year 2000” was a huge deal for futuristic stuff and the reference to it here is kind of funny.
This little car is pretty wild. Not because of performance, not because of looks, but because of it being a canvas that GM engineers used to not only see into the future, but to predict it.
