The great tragedy of 2019 is knowing that we won’t get the 2020 BMW 3 Series wagon here in the United States. It’s objectively uncool, especially when I just learned the 3 Series wagon’s rear window can pop open.
If I were to be callused and jaded, I’d say this doesn’t matter to me in the slightest, since it’s a feature on a car I’ll never see in my home country. But it’s a very neat little feature nonetheless and I want my European friends to know about it in order to maximize the use they can get out of their wagon. Look!
Apparently, BMW’s engineers had to “fight to retain” the wagon’s independently opening rear window because “not enough owners know about it,” reports Autocar after speaking with a BMW product manager.
He told the outlet: “It’s a bit of a hidden thing. We argued we should keep it – but we need customers to know about it, or it will die.”You might ask, why? Why would anyone need this? To which I’d answer, why wouldn’t people need this? Sometimes you don’t need to open the entire trunk. Sometimes you are storing something in there and you don’t want to slam the trunk door on it. Sometimes you need to retrieve something quickly. Sometimes you need to reach in there to make sure stuff doesn’t roll out before opening the main door. Sometimes you want to give your dog some air but you don’t want it leaving the car. The possibilities are endless! Plus, because it’s a wagon, even vertically challenged people like me can make use of the independently opening rear window. If this were on an SUV, it’d be a little pointless, since I probably couldn’t adequately reach through the rear window. But the wagon is lower, so I can’t imagine I’d have much of a problem enjoying the window like everyone else does. Honestly, I don’t know why wagons and hatchbacks don’t all have independently opening rear windows. via Motor1
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