There was a strange time warp at the 2006 North American International Auto Show in Detroit. The calendar said it was January 2006 but the cars on display made many think the clock had been turned back more than three and a half decades.

On display were a new Shelby Mustang, a new Dodge Challenger and a new Chevrolet Camaro. The last time all of those constellations aligned was a quarter-century plus 11 years ago.

But it appears the pony car era, created in the mid-1960s with the birth of the original Ford Mustang and then resurrected a couple of years ago with the rebirth of the '69 Mustang as a 2005 model, is galloping again. Not only did Chevrolet unveil its Camaro concept but the Chrysler Group unveiled a very retro Dodge Challenger concept.

While the smoothly curvaceous Challenger looked like it was simply reissued, though in a somewhat more modern size because of its Chrysler LX underpinnings, the Camaro concept had a more contemporary and angular appearance that looked cutting edge, and we mean that both literally and figuratively.