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Welcome to Down On The Street , where we admire old vehicles found parked on the streets of the Island That Rust Forgot: Alameda, California. Even though we had a GM A-Body here just last week , I liked the look of this Skylark so much that I just can't wait to share it. This could mean that Chrysler A-Body fans might feel slighted (yes, nearly a month has gone by since our last one ), but not to worry- there's a Valiant in the queue now! When you go to car shows full of Detroit machinery, you'll probably see more of the Buick GS than you will of the regular Skylark, much as you do with the GTO-versus-LeMans situation. Here's a Skylark owner who took the best-looking feature of the GS (the hood) and kept the rest of the Skylark badging and trim, which I think works pretty well. This car isn't perfect by any means- in fact, it's a little battered- but it's in excellent shape for what it is: a nearly 40-year-old car that parks in a busy downtown urban area and...
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Welcome to Down On The Street , where we admire old vehicles found parked on the streets of the Island That Rust Forgot: Alameda, California. After seeing some kind of weird foreign wagon yesterday, we're going to return to good ol' vintage Detroit iron today. Yes, before The General got all innovative with electron-powered machinery, he was building two-ton cruisers that didn't just park- they dropped anchor. This one is a '74 Buick LeSabre, a car that told OPEC it didn't give a damn about the 1973 Oil Crisis ! I found this car on the same block as the Studebaker Avanti , '69 Buick , and the '65 Ranchero . The Luxus was the high-end LeSabre for '74, and it came standard with a snazzy steering wheel, special hubcaps, and a vinyl notchback seat. The convertible sold for $4,696, about 50 bucks less than the '74 Caprice Classic convertible. Yes, the big Chevy convertible cost more than the big Buick convertible! This example is in great shape, either a low...
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You think the supply of old cars and trucks parked on the streets of Alameda will dry up, now that we've hit the 300 point? I doubt it, not when you can still find Early Malaise Era landyachts like this Electra being used as daily transportation. Five-dollar gas be damned! I found this car parked near the former Alameda Naval Air Station, where thousands of nuclear weapons once sat it earthen bunkers and thousands of sailors once drove second-gen Camaros. Nowadays they shoot movies and make vodka at the old NAS, and the sound of A6s and P3s no longer competes with the roar of small-block Chevy engines. Heraldic crests! Knights in armor! Seeing this hood ornament, I find it impossible to believe that Buick didn't offer an Electra Brougham for '73. Surely there must be some mistake! Just in time for the Arab oil embargo of '73, this 4,682-pound dreamboat purred down the highway courtesy of a 210-horse 455 engine. That seems like a pretty poor power-to-weight ratio, but keep...
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Most of you approved of the super-beater '70 Skylark , with a small but vocal minority who felt physical pain at the very sight of the beat-to-hell Buick. I'm pretty sure that the approval rating of today's Skylark will be be fairly high across the board, given that it's a 40-year-old red convertible that lives on the street and all. This clean-looking Buick parks just across the street from the yellow '72 Beetle we saw last year. The Skylark Custom came with the luxury trim package, including fender skirts and plush padded vinyl interior. The standard engine was a 250-inch six, but just about all buyers opened their wallets for the 230-horse Buick 350 (and some went ahead and paid for the 300 horsepower 400). Mmmm, padded vinyl! This car listed at $3,098 new, which was 97 bucks more than the Fairlane GT convertible (and 700 bucks less than the '68 Lotus Europa). These photographs date from more than a year ago; it was actually one of the first cars I shot for this...
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You know what we haven't had in this series? Donks! Oakland, just across a narrow estuary from Alameda, has a fair number of donkified GM cars , but the trend seems to be dying out. In any case, donkmania never got very big in Alameda, where old-school musclecars and lowriders seem to be the customization themes of choice. Here's a rare Alameda donk, which I shot next to Alameda High over the winter (no, it doesn't rain here in June). The car parked on that block every school day, so is it a teacher's car or a student's? Not sure if a student could afford 24s, but how many teachers would slap sparkly "24" emblems on the pillars? The '69 Continental that parks just down the block could well be a student car, though it's summer vacation now and the Lincoln is still there. As we know, most Jalopniks prefer a dekotora to a donk , but there's no need to get all riled up over a '76 Regal 4-door with 24s if you don't groove on the donk thing; wheels...
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Not long ago, we saw our third DOTS Oldsmobile . With 170 cars so far in the series, you'd think Olds would be better represented... and now I've just realized that Buick has a mere three cars as well (the '70 Skylark , the '71 LeSabre , and the '76 Skyhawk . We've got plenty of examples of Chevrolet, Pontiac, and Cadillac here, so the question is: Do Alameda residents have a bias against the #2 and #3 most prestigious marques in the old GM hierarchy? Bias or not, I've found another old Buick on the island, bringing the total tally to four. One of the best things about 60s GM cars is the treatment of the rear marker lights; while this one doesn't have the rocket shape of the Olds light or the arrowhead shape of the Pontiac, its shield logo is still pretty snazzy. Speaking of snazz, remember when American carmakers didn't try to emulate "classy" European cars via the use of cheapo plastic interior components? In the 60s, Detroit added class to...
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One thing you don't see too often in Alameda is cars with horrible rust. Another rare sight is a big old Detroit bomb being used as a serious bicycle transporter. Today we're going to look at a car that offers both! This '70 Skylark lives just down the street from the '69 Ambassador wagon and around the corner from the '76 Skyhawk , and it is one mean-looking Buick. galleryPost('DOTS70SkylarkTop', 6, '1970 Buick Skylark Down On The Street, Part 1'); This car has been in its neighborhood for a long time, but I've never been able to find out whether the owner (who's clearly a fan of Bianchi bicycles) chooses such a beautifully wretched car in order to express contempt or admiration for the very concept of the automobile. You never know with bike freaks- they tend to appreciate machinery more than most, but they can be touchy on the subject of motor vehicles. Very clever homemade bike racks here- looks like you strap the rear wheels into these channels...
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