Why I’m Putting Away The Keys To My BMW i3s For A While To Enjoy My Gas Cars

The summer is upon us, and I have the keys to the most perfect BMW i3 on earth — the Holy Grail, a Galvanic Gold, Giga World-interior’d marvel from Leipzig. I also have the keys to my old 144,000 miles 2014 BMW i3 workhorse. But both of those keys are being hung up for much of this summer, because I want to enjoy my gas cars. Here’s why.

Gas prices in California are hovering around $5 a gallon, which is a lot, but sort of manageable. I remember in 2008 when the dollar was worth way more and gas prices were in the $4 range; things aren’t quite that bad in California, but they’re getting close. Look around the streets, even in nicer parts of town like Santa Monica where residents can afford a new EV, and you’ll see that most vehicles are still gasoline-powered.

In fact, if you look at year-to-date sales of new vehicles in California, you’ll see that not quite 25 percent of cars sold in 2024 are zero-emissions vehicles (which includes EVs, PHEVs, and fuel-cell vehicles). You can see in this plot from the California Energy Commission that the Tesla Model Y has played a huge roll in cranking those figures up:

Still, a quarter of all new sales doesn’t mean a quarter of cars on the road — in fact, based on a cursory web search, it seems like just around 5 percent of registered vehicles in California are electric. Yes, 19 out of 20 light-duty vehicles on the road in California burn some sort of fossil fuel.

So the EV era has begun, but it’s not yet in full swing, and while I’ve been obsessing over BMW i3s for the past year or so (see above), I’ve come to the realization that I should enjoy my gas cars while I can. I’ve been driving all sorts of EVs for the past year or so — the new Cybertruck, the Lexus RZ, the Fisker Ocean, the Lotus Eletre — they’re awesome machines. Objectively superior to gasoline counterparts in so many ways. But there’s a similarity in the way they all behave — almost like driving a bunch of gas cars with the exact same engines. The torque curves and the sound feel exactly the same. And there are chassis similarities, too, with all EVs having their considerable heft between the axles, and all featuring fully independent suspension.

There’s something exciting about hopping behind the wheel of a car like a front-engine, front-wheel drive, high-revving four cylinder car like a Honda Civic Type R and realizing: My god, this is so different than, say, a rear-drive flat-four Subaru BRZ or a rear-engine, flat-six Porsche 911 or a V8 E90 BMW M3. The engines — the way they sound, the way they make torque, their location (and thus weight distribution). The variety is awesome.

I realize I’m probably preaching to the choir here, and that my “DT’s random Saturday thoughts” blog here is hardly profound, but it’s recently dawned on me: Why rush to driving EVs? I’ve got the rest of my life to drive those.

And while, sure, I don’t own a Civic Type R or a Porsche 911, I do own a 1966 Ford Mustang with a honkin’ V8 engine. I have a 1991 Jeep Wrangler with a torquey inline-six. I have an old truck with a straight six and a four-speed-on-the-floor. I’ve got a ZJ I’m working on — one with two coil-sprung solid axles that offer off-road articulation like no EV suspension ever has.

My point is that, there’s going to come a time when driving gas cars isn’t easy. That much is inevitable. When 100% of residents in certain neighborhoods drive EVs, they’ll begin to see gas cars driving through their neighborhoods as threats to their children’s health, and what argument can one make against that? You can’t. Gas cars will be banned from certain neighborhoods, and it’s inevitable.

 

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What’s more, on a more macro scale, I could see gas prices climbing, especially here in California, and more and more restrictions placed on these vehicles. In 30 years, it’s possible that driving gas cars in LA won’t be allowed. We’ve seen similar things in certain cities in Europe — it’s only a matter of time before our beloved ICE steeds are shunned by the masses, and our ability to enjoy them on public streets becomes throttled.

It’s not going to happen anytime soon, but I’m 32 years old. It’s possible I won’t be able to drive my Jeep J10 freely and easily on public roads by the time I hit my twilight years. And here in California, it’s possible I’ll have a hard time piloting that old truck by the time I hit the big Five-Oh. So I’m going to enjoy these gas cars while I can. Gas stations are plentiful, fuel pricing is expensive but not insane yet, and because gas cars are in the majority, folks aren’t sneering at my fuel-burning machine, plotting for ways to keep it out of their neighborhood.

I’m gonna listen to the burble of that Ford 289 V8; feel those crisp shifts just “snick” into place as I row through my J10 and Wrangler YJ’s manual transmissions; marvel at my ZJ’s incredibly well-spoken suspension (that’s a terrible play on the word “articulate”). These vehicles offer experiences that EVs just can’t, and while I think my BMW i3s are, objectively, my best cars, there’s really nothing “objective” about joy. And, while I still can, I’m going to wring every drop of that from my gas cars.

2024 is my summer of stick shifts, smooth straight-six torque, and V8 grunt.