Look, no keys! In common with a large portion of the redesigned Renault range, the new Megane sports saloon comes with an utterly key-free entry system. Instead of having to lug one of those cumbersome metal things around (so last summer), you, as the authorised driver, are issued with a pass. It is roughly the dimensions of a credit card, except, unfortunately, in its thickness, which it shares with a decent-quality chopping board. In other words, you won't be slipping the pass in with your personal plastic unless you first build an extension on your wallet.
No matter. The important point is that, with your Renault pass stowed somewhere on your person - in your pocket, say, or in your handbag, or Action Man-style as a dog tag round your neck - you've only got to walk up to your Megane and it will recognise you and unlock its doors in joyful and puppyish welcome. It's a pretty special feeling when a car greets you like that. If only it had a little tail to thump on the ground.
And because it knows you to be family, the car will fire up for you at a mere touch of its start button, even though the pass hasn't moved from your pocket/bag/neck. Say farewell for ever, then, to ignition-fumbling misery. Time to get out? Just slam the door, press the auto-lock button, neatly dimpling the door handle, and walk away. The car sits patiently until you return. And you won't hear so much as a whimper out of it.
Few would deny that keyless entry was a major advance in driver-friendly technology. True, the extremely paranoid might have their reservations ("If the car knows I am here, what else does it know about me? Does it know what I just did?"). But anyone who has ever approached a car in the pelting rain with two suitcases under one arm and three children under the other is going to warm to something that doesn't additionally require you to go rummaging in your pocket for a slip of metal on a rubber thong.
That said, the old method did have its plus points. Attach a key to a big enough fob and it becomes a status symbol, a massive message of ownership to leave lying oh so discreetly on bar counters and coffee tables. Your traditional key can also be a jangly comfort in moments of social awkwardness, not to mention a handy weapon in a fight. I don't know what use your Renault pass would be, in the event of it abruptly kicking off around you, unless you could somehow get your assailant to chew on it. A smart tap on the nose might momentarily startle him or her, but would not, I fear, put him or her down.
I think we need to reflect carefully upon what would be lost before we move unthinkingly forward to a world without car keys. Also, the big problem with car keys is forgetting where you put them, and the Renault pass brings us no closer to a solution to this. You've still got to remember to take it with you and you've still got an equally high chance of leaving it in yesterday's clothes - possibly higher, in fact, given the casualness that the keyless system encourages. What we really need is a car that finally removes the need for any kind of entry token by smelling you. But that, one concedes, may be a couple of years off.
Keyless entry is just one of the features on the new Megane sports saloon that enables Renault to claim that you are getting an upmarket car for midmarket money. Other glam touches include the F1-style integrated fuel filler cap, electronically folding door mirrors, rain and light sensors, interior lights that dim theatrically, and a more than commonly flashy set of warning signs on the dashboard, where a little picture of the car is constantly illuminated and ready to inform you the minute anything snaps off or catches fire. (Being a new Renault, this is unlikely to happen more than once a month.)
The car is built on the platform of the upgraded, award-winning Megane hatchback, but does a convincing enough impression of a stand-alone car, being entirely unfuturistic around the rear end and faintly Passat-like overall. I drove the two-litre version and found it fast and light to the touch - unnervingly so. It was as if the idea of keylessness had been expanded to include the accelerator and gearstick, too, so that these items merely required me to be sitting in the car in order to work of their own volition. By contrast, the handbrake - in common with the lever on the hatchback - is a giant lump of metal in the shape of the throttle on a Boeing 747. Quite why this should be the case I never worked out, though I suppose it would be useful if you ever gained altitude, which, given enough open road in fifth gear, would probably be just about possible. If it happens to you, don't panic. Try tossing your Renault card out of the window. In theory, the car should follow it down.
The lowdown
Name: Renault Megane sports saloon 2.0 Privilege
Price: £15,300
Top speed: 126mph
Acceleration: 0-62mph in 9.4 seconds
Consumption: 35.3mpg
At the wheel: Matt Dawson
On the stereo: Dido
En route for: Twickenham
