Towards the end of the year there were four car-free Sundays in Germany. The bans were accepted stoically, and the freeways were never as empty as they were then. And with two horsepower you finally made progress.
Image: Bridgeman Images
We’ve been looking back at the cars from 50 years ago for 25 years in January. What was launched back then and what moved the world? The most important novelties of 1973. The year of the oil crisis.
The year 1973 is a kind of in-between year for Germany. The Olympic Games in Munich were over, and the 1974 World Cup in Germany was just around the corner. Important things happen right at the beginning of the year, military service is reduced from 18 to 15 months, and Denmark, Great Britain and Ireland join the European Union. On January 14th, Elvis Presley will play his legendary “Aloha for Hawaii”, which is the first concert ever to be broadcast worldwide by satellite.
Boris Schmidt
Editor in the “Technology and Engine” department.
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For the automotive world, the year starts, as always, with the Geneva Motor Show in March. “Japanese cars continue to advance,” this newspaper reported on the 21st, taking into account the fact that more and more Japanese manufacturers are also beginning to market their products in Germany and Europe. Mazda was new at the time, but last year the F.A.Z. cars from the Far East were recognized in driving reports for the first time, the Datsun 1600 and the Toyota Celica. On April 4, 1973, the new Datsun Cherry is number 3 in the engine section of the F.A.Z., the Cherry is one of the Japanese car models that ultimately brought success, even if a really noticeable “Japan boom” only set in at the beginning of the 1980s will. A small aperçu: The Toyota Corona MK II 2000 also appears in the 1973 driving reports in the summer.