This week marks the opening of the 2022 New York International Auto Show, where journalists from around the world come to our humble little city drunk on the promise of getting to ride a Jeep up a steep thing and then back down that same steep thing. But as the media previews end and the journalists filter out, the adoring automotive fans begin pouring in — and that’s when things can get really fun.
While journalists attend auto shows to network, cover debuts, or commit daring, historic heists, fans attend to see all the cars that they’d never find elsewhere. Cars like the new Z, the Corvette Z06, or that camper Tacoma build that I think Owen wants to move into when his lease is up. It’s got more square footage than the average New York apartment, at least.
I first attended the New York International Auto Show as a kid, back when the Jeep obstacle course was the absolute height of excitement. There were so many new cars, things I wouldn’t see again for years and would never see regularly. To a young, budding enthusiast, auto shows can be places that create formative memories — setting you on a new, lifelong course of cars.
I should specify that car show memories, while great, don’t qualify here. We’re talking the big auto shows, attended by manufacturers and held in convention centers two thousand times the size of my apartment. Your Cars and Coffee stories are always loved, but that may be a question for another day.
But what’s your best auto show memory? Did you get to sit in a new Corvette as a child, sparking a lifelong love of all things adorned with a bow-tie badge? Did a chance encounter with a brand’s marketing executive lead you down the path of working for that company later in life? Tell us your formative auto show experiences, and we’ll collect our favorites tomorrow afternoon.