Going though some old photos, I found this picture a then 5-year old me took of the cars on my childhood street, in the summer of 1998. In order, the cars pictured are a Toyota Corolla, Volkswagen Jetta, Plymouth Neon, and Mercury Cougar.
When I took this, I was standing out in front of my house, and these cars were parked outside our next door neighbor, Mrs. Sorensen’s house. Mrs. Sorensen herself drove a maroon Dodge Aries at the time, her last car before she gave up driving, as she was well into her eighties. The Plymouth Neon was owned by her daughter, Agnes, and the Corolla was owned by Agnes’ daughter. They both lived nearby and visited often.
The Jetta, which appears to be a VR6, belonged to Maureen, who occupied the white house whose porch is sticking out in the top left corner of the picture. The house actually belonged to Maureen’s sister and brother in-law, the Crowleys, but they were living abroad in London at the time for work, so Maureen house-sat for them for about two years. As for the Cougar, its owner lived two houses down from Mrs. Sorensen, but I never really knew who he or she was. It’s funny how you can be neighbors with someone for years, and never meet them.
Although this isn’t the most interesting assortment of cars from the era, it’s nonetheless fun looking back on memory lane, errr… Hawthorn Road, that is.
I think that Jetta is a Trek edition.
Where have all the Neons gone, long time passsiiiing?
They went to the big junkyard in the sky.
One, I saw one 1995-99 Neon at a local junkyard yesterday.
Nonsense! They’re reincarnated, of course.
The question is, was it a good car or a bad one? Has it been made into a garbage truck or a roadster?
They reincarnated into the new Dodge Dart!
That generation and color of Corolla always reminds me of Office Space. I could be over analyzing, but I always thought they carefully selected that specific car for its extreme blandness to match the main character’s life. (like the Camry in American Beauty)
Of the four cars, I’ve had plenty of experience with three of these. My parents had three of that generation Corolla’s twin, the Geo Prism, one red and two white. They also had a ’96 Plymouth Neon, also in white. Finally, my best friend had two Cougars of that generation, a white ’94 and an emerald ’97. What are the odds of that?
The Corolla in that color reminded me of a 4/5ths scale Lexus. I always thought that was an expensive looking car, even if it wasn’t. I think the next gen had the trunk lid cut on a diagonal; like the ’86 E300 and later Lexus. I’m referring to the cut above the taillights.
I agree, it does look like a baby LS 400 of the era. I had a 1993 Corolla DX. It was a completely trouble free car. I wouldn’t call the styling bland, especially not for that time. I found it pleasing and not obtrusive.
I think it’s true that for we car-crazed little boys and girls, we never forget the cars on the street where we grew up. This is where I show my age, because the cars on 5-year-old-Brandon’s street still look pretty current to me. They’re not, of course, at least not any more.
What were the most interesting cars on the street where you grew up would be an interesting QOTD.
I like that QOTD idea. Though honestly those cars don’t look very old at all to me either, but perhaps that’s because my DD is from the 90’s and my other cars are from the 80’s and 70’s…
Liked that model Corolla.
In Europe we got this monstrosity after that mini Lexus one
The one on the left the bug eye model was the first one and the version on the right is the facelift model.
Pure yuck.
And even worse they were built in Derbyshire in England and I heard the quality wasn’t very good..At least in the early models.
The japanese domestic market model..Doesn’t look too bad.
Almost hard to believe they are the same car.
Back then I wondered where the idea of that stupid little perforated chrome grille (black on your example) and those bug eyes came from.
The answer: from their own 1999 first gen Yaris. But it worked on that cute small hatchback.
My Grandma’s Corolla and our old one
How it looks today
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Hawthorn+Rd,+Milton,+MA+02186/@42.2644541,-71.0907033,16z/data=!4m2!3m1!1s0x89e37c18d05028e9:0x31f4ea1f79f058ad?hl=en
It’s eerie, these look like normal cars to me…I realized that that is because I still see 1998-2001 or so as what normal IS, (I was in high school at the time) as that was when I formed into the beginnings of an adult and how I came to understand the world, what to expect from it, etc. Then 9/11, the economic downturns of 2001 and 2008 happened, and I kind of tuned out sometime after 2005, I was in law school and then dealing with the ramifications of the crash and the weird result is I draw blanks on generations of cars between then and now. I stopped paying attention when these cars were normal (somewhat the same with baseball, about which I used to have an encyclopedic knowledge 15 years ago but couldn’t likely name more than one or two position players on any team now). I can remember so much about the cars on my street from 1986-2003 or so. Not much after.
These all look contemporary to me as well, Cougar notwithstanding since I see one everyday obviously. I pretty much see the other three commonly too though, albiet a bit worse for wear on average. I can’t remember the last time I’ve seen that generation Corolla with wheelcovers, most just show off the rusty black steelies underneath.
Overall I think car styling hasn’t changed that much since the mid 90s, other than vertical growth and more organic looking headlight/taillight assemblies(which was just beginning to happen back then), once aero took hold across the industry there really weren’t that many ways to make them look different. Plus with these all being sedans(minus the Cougar and possibly the Neon) the difference in design is pretty minimal. Modern coupes look much different fromtheir 90s equivelants than sedans do. The original Audi TT really seemed to have a huge influence on coupes to date, that stubby arch shaped look
A modern car looks like a ’90s car stung by 10,000 bees.
Yeah, that’s the difference between the 2000 car and the 2015 car. Both aero, both relatively compact. But the 2015 is having a horrible allergic reaction.
I had two of those Corollas during my college years, a 1993 and a 1995. A few years ago, I had a chance to drive one again, and I had forgotten how small they were! Still, I wouldn’t mind having another one again.
Somewhere around here I have a couple of pics of cars I took on the street where I grew up in the late 1980’s. There were some people that always had a visitor who had a beautiful 1979 Olds Cutlass Supreme Brougham. I got my nerve up once to ask her if I could take a pic, and she scowled at me and said “NO”! Well, that didn’t stop me…I just took a pic from a distance the next time she came over!
Here in Southern California, the only one I ever see in large numbers anymore is the Corolla. Using my uncle’s ’93-ish Cougar as reference, I’m guessing the rest of those Cougars spontaneously combusted too because I rarely see those (his caught fire around this time). I’m only one year older than you, I remember seeing those Neons everywhere especially the school parking lot, they seem to have vanished off the face of the earth. That generation Jetta is my favorite Jetta, I wanted a VR6 exactly like that one but all the remaining Jettas of that generation all seem to be falling apart in disrepair. I can’t believe these cars are 17+ years old they still look contemporary to me. Have they really aged well or am I just refusing the fact all these years have gone by?
Always wanted to find a good 94 VR6 Jetta. That’s the only German built MK3 Jetta you could get in the US. The one I did find the owner wanted crazy money and it had high miles.
The biggest difference between those cars and todays cars is the roof. ’90s cars still have a windshield, a roof, & a rear window each of which is a separate plane. Todays cars mostly have an arc that contains all 3.
Below the beltline, cars have pretty much been a box with rounded corners since the ’80s.
“Mrs. Sorensen” was my grandma! She drove a Relient K in her final years of driving. 🙂