| Fair enough - I did fail to give Toyota credit, where credit is definitely due. But I would say it is more a case of "necessary, but not sufficient." Toyota unarguably pushed electric into the unsexy, mass production, mass consumption mainstream. This was a necessary step. But Tesla showed that electric COULD be luxury, performance, etc - not necessary for mass market - but the related headlines generated arguably were. But also that _pure electric_ could be delivered with _more than enough_ range to eliminate range anxiety, even with "notably better than a Prius" levels of performance. And it could at least appear to be "mass manufactured" (even if, on Toyota/Chevy/Nissan scale, or if you will, BMW/Mercedes/Lexus/etc they really weren't). This WAS necessary, and did cause a tipping point that, IMHO led to the Chevy Bolt. The Prius led to the Bolt evolutionarily. The Model 3 led to the Bolt "by Marketing force." And now we have a Bolt.. and basically no Model 3. We'll see what happens in the next couple of years. |