Home
Cars
The twentieth century is marked remembered for many things, including the rise or television, film and other technological achievements, but one thing that stands out from this is the rise of the car, or automobile. We all know what they are, the wheeling vehicles we use everyday to transport ourselves, our friends and our family to various destinations. We use roads all of the time, in fact if you look at any map of the United Kingdom you will not be surprised to see almost the entire country engulfed in a complex system of motorways and A roads. In fact, simple road atlas is all the proof you need to see how much the car plays into everyday life.
Now although the car is often thought of as a huge part of the twentieth century, its conception dates back as far as the 1700s depending on your definition of car. However, if we consider the modern automobile it's reasonable to credit Karl Benz as the creator in the 1880s. Benz created a four-stroke cycle gasoline engine and developed a car from it in Mannheim, Germany in 1885 and granted a patent by the following January. Later, people such as Henry Ford continued these breakthroughs, Ford himself being the father of modern assembly lines used in mass production.
Today cars are everywhere and the designs have advanced far beyond what was produced by Benz over a hundred years ago. The fastest street-legal car was produced in 2007. The SSC Ultimate Aero TT, which registered a speed of 256.18 mph (412 km/h). Such a development is a testament to the technological advances of the twentieth century.
As a result, it is no wonder how much of an effect the car is having on society. One of the most popular programmes on British television is the car-based show Top Gear which is estimated to have 385 million viewers worldwide and has been developed for other markets such as America and Australia.
However, there are other benefits that the car has brought: economy benefits (automobile production and maintenance), transportation provision, society wellbeing derived from leisure and travel opportunities, and revenue generation from the tax opportunities. There is also an increased ability for humans to travel from place to place. On top of that even the negative environmental impact of the car is having a positive result as new environmentally friendly alternative are being sought.
The future should bring a lot more to the car and it will be exciting to see where else we can go.