Toyota Announces New Plug-In Prius Prime With Video Straight Out of 'Tron'
The Toyota Prius Prime drives on glowing 'Tron'-like city roads.
Toyota must have watched a lot of sci-fi movies to make its recent promotional video for the new Prius Prime. A gleaming aquamarine car zooms on futuristic translucent roads like something out of the movie Tron (it’s even got the cinematic music to match). Today, Toyota announced its latest Prius, or the family of quietly humming cars, called Prime.
Bill Fay, the group vice president and general manager of Toyota, unveiled the model at the 2016 New York International Auto Show today and he said, “We gave it the name Prime, because it represents the best.” Toyota’s release further elaborated that the technology in this car makes Prime the best-equipped Prius in the model’s history.
Tron-lovers, Toyota has a commercial for you.
Toyota says Prime can last 22 miles and drive up to 84 mph in all-electric mode. Prime has an upgraded battery and an improved hybrid system which boosted the manufacturer-estimated 120 or above miles per gallon equivalent, which is a 26 percent enhancement over the previous model. While it’s still got the same four-cylinder engine as the 2016 model, the engine’s 40 percent thermal efficiency is still better than most other automobile’s 25 to 30 percent thermal efficiency. And prime also rocks some pretty impressive energy-conserving quad LED headlights.
Prime is nothing short of a smart car. The Toyota Safety Sense system has pedestrian detection, automatic braking, lane departure alerts, and steering assistance. As far as the fun tech features inside the car, Prime sports an 11.6-inch HD screen equipped with standard navigation.
Fay also announced that Toyota has partnered with ChargePoint, an electric vehicle charging station company in Campbell, California which provides the world’s largest network of electric vehicle charging stations in the United States, Europe, and Australia. The partnership will give Prius owners access to over 20,000 charging stations in the United States, 60 percent of which are free to users, says Fay.
Prius Prime will be available in all 50 states and will start making its way into showrooms in late fall 2016.
