Seventy of Canada’s top automotive journalists spent a week in the picturesque tourist town of Niagara-on-the-Lake; but not for the scenery or the wine tasting. Journalist members of the Automobile Journalists Association of Canada (AJAC) were there for the express purpose of determining the ‘Best New’ cars, trucks and SUV/CUVs in 12 different vehicle categories, as part of AJAC’s annual Canadian Car of the Year Awards program.

The three days of intensive, back-to-back testing and evaluation are known in the automotive industry as “TestFest”. The results of the journalists’ test-drive evaluations were released during a press conference wherein the winners in 12 categories were announced.

The results were compiled by the international accounting firm KPMG and kept confidential even from AJAC until the press conference. They were determined from more than 46,000 individual data points established in the testing of 157 different vehicles.

The purpose of the AJAC awards is to provide consumers with a valuable resource they can use when researching the purchase of a new vehicle – one that includes a broad range of comparative information on vehicles that are new to the market. That information includes not just specifications and features but actual performance data and subjective ratings on up to 23 different characteristics – from interior roominess and comfort to ride quality and handling ability.