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"Science fiction writers, I am sorry to say, really do not know anything. We can't talk about science, because our knowledge of it is limited and unofficial, and usually our fiction is dreadful."
- Philip K. Dick

Groundcar (or Ground Car)  
  A non-skimming, non-flying vehicle.  

One of the ways a writer can emphasize the extraordinary advances of a culture is to use verbiage to suggest that current technology is old-fashioned.

I will return in three hours, as well before sunset the wind makes it impossible to get even a ground car into the port.
From Galactic Patrol, by E.E. 'Doc' Smith.
Published by Street and Smith in 1937
Additional resources -

Robert Heinlein used it in Methuselah's Children in 1941:

She dropped down the lift tube from Ventura's apartment, claimed her speedy ground car from the attending automaton in the basement and set the control combination for North Shore.

Isaac Asimov used it in Bridle and Saddle (Foundation) in 1942 in Astounding Science Fiction:

Lee was at the window and his voice broke in on Hardin's reverie. "They've come," he said, "in a last-model ground car, the young pups."

I like words like this; compare to static house or inert-wear or flat photo or tru-mem systems or post-crime punishment or tree-grown wood or manual closet or meat person or dirt-farming.

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Additional resources:
  More Ideas and Technology from Galactic Patrol
  More Ideas and Technology by E.E. 'Doc' Smith
  Tech news articles related to Galactic Patrol
  Tech news articles related to works by E.E. 'Doc' Smith

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