Could a vehicle be deemed the ultimate hockey mom vehicle if it is only available in Canada's bigger cities?
The Ford Escape hybrid isn't available in my hometown. The local dealership, where an in-law works, doesn't carry the hybrid model because the interest simply isn't there. Customers in Belleville, Ont., it seems, aren't willing to pay an extra $6,000 for great mileage and a cleaner ride.
Their loss.
I bet they would be willing to pay a little more upfront if they knew the Ford Escape hybrid easily clocks 598 kilometres of mixed city and highway driving on only 50 litres of gas. You read that right: The hybrid Escape outperforms, fuel-wise, any of the vehicles I've tested for this ultimate hockey vehicle experiment.
When your vehicle takes you that far, there's no need for a giant gas tank and a giant wallet. When your vehicle is that green, there's no need to worry about dumping tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere in the name of our national sport.
Drivers might be surprised to learn, too, that driving a hybrid doesn't require parking near an electrical outlet — you don't have to plug in a hybrid. It creates its own energy, recharging the battery as you drive.
And that battery space doesn't eat up valuable cargo space. The Ford Escape hybrid has as much cargo space as the regular Ford Escape.
Which, admittedly, looks lacking.
The Ford Escape looks like a small vehicle. It doesn't have that sense of heft that so many SUV drivers love.
It's true you won't be able to pack your entire house, including the microwave, into the back for a trip down east. Even a three-day journey to Quebec City for five women of varying ages, women who love their clothing and who love to shop (is there any other kind?) is a squeeze.
But you have to ask yourself: Do you really need to buy a bigger and less fuel-efficient vehicle for that one or two weeks of the year you do want the extra space?
If you have only one or two kids, do you really need five seats in the back? I had grand visions of combined family outings to the beach when we bought our minivan. That happens once, maybe twice, a year. Does that justify the environmental cost?
And if you don't plan to drive Grammy and Papa to the rink once a week, why are you paying for extra fuel and pumping more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere for the luxury of extra seats you rarely put bums in?
The reality is our lives are so scripted to the last minute with mum and dad's unsynchronized work schedules, constantly clashing hockey schedules, dance classes and piano and guitar lessons, that we are seldom able to co-ordinate sharing with other parents the drive to hockey practices and games.
I know it's hard to shake the idealistic images that a minivan offers, especially if, like me, you're of the more-the-merrier line of thinking. We cling to those visions, but sometimes you just have to cut the cord. And guess what? By cutting the cord, you cut the guilt factor, too. You know the one: the one fuelled by all those unfulfilled visions of group outings to provincial parks and carpooling to the game.
With gas prices in flux and enormous chunks of the Arctic ice shelf falling into the sea, it's a bit easier to put your own life into perspective. Bigger isn't better. Superior fuel economy and fewer greenhouse gas emissions are.
The fact is the Ford Escape hybrid will fit your hockey bags and suitcases and backpacks and get you through those tournament weekends. It's not as spacious as a minivan, or an Explorer or other environmentally unfriendly SUVs. But we're not the cargo-gluttons we used to be, either.
