This article is interesting.
Tentative agreement will bring new transmission line to city.
Especially this statement:
Government officials say an agreement in principle for the $300-million to $400-million six-speed, rear-wheel drive transmission line was penned Friday between General Motors and the provincial and federal governments.
coupled with:
The automaker's $245-million investment to produce fuel-efficienttransmissions in St. Catharines hinged on receiving a combined $140 million from Queen's Park and Ottaw a for both the transmission line and a research centre planned for the company's Oshaw a plant.
Add to that the news that part of the deal has to do with a hybrid (or hybrids) being built in Oshawa and you wonder if we'll see hybrid Zetas coming out of Oshawa. I think we're actually going to see hybrid pickups coming out of Oshawa.
Of course, not much else is being said about the deal.
EDIT: According to the Globe and Mail it's a mid-size hybrid car!
Ottawa's deal with GM allows small reprieve from job cuts
And that can only mean it's a Zeta mid-size hybrid.
CONFIRMED:
GM Canada - Industry Canada: Exchange of Letters. Official news from the feds. Note the following:
I am pleased to note, however, that GMCL has now agreed to invest an additional $290 million to manufacture 6-speed transmissions at St. Catharines, produce a hybrid variant of a mid-sized vehicle at the Oshawa Car Plant, and attract advanced environmental technology research and development projects through GMCL's Canadian Engineering Centre (CEC).
:
The production for the mid-sized car is scheduled to begin in October 2010, with hybrid production commencing in early 2011.
So, what is this new hybrid, mid-size car to be produced in Oshawa? Is it a mid-size Zeta? Has GM just been sandbagging re: RWD? Obviously it's not an existing car since production for the mid-sized car begins October 2010! If it was the current Impala, that's already being built. Did they shorten the Impala to improve fuel economy by saving weight and using RWD as a differentiator? Is this a Buick or a Cadillac or a Pontiac?
Things just keep getting more interesting.