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<\/a>Despite being h-e-a-v-y and having the world’s largest turning circle, it had decent acceleration and was maneuverable enough to handle San Francisco traffic.\u00a0 It was also one of the more practical cars I’ve owned.\u00a0 It’s footprint is small so it fits into parking spaces.\u00a0 It’s tall so there’s a lot of room inside.\u00a0 What it doesn’t have is boot space because much of that is taken by the hybrid battery.\u00a0 They can be purchased used for a good price, kitted out.\u00a0 Mine had all options except the moonroof.\u00a0 \u00a0I was able to get 500 miles\/tank driving in hilly, uber\/lyft choked, traffic calmed San Francisco. The current owner in flat Sacramento gets 1000 miles\/tank.\u00a0 See?<\/p>\nNot bad for a 4100 pound car.\u00a0 Now in comparison, I have been looking at other cars that weigh about 4000 pounds.\u00a0 The Alfa Stelvio, for one.\u00a0 It’s about 4000 pounds, but it’s a crossover SUV.\u00a0 It’s built on the Giulia chassis so there’s some of that “fun to drive” element to it.\u00a0 Or at least, as much fun as you can get driving an SUV fast.<\/p>\n It’s a good looking SUV and although I drove it in Monterey and was less than impressed (because I had just driven its really fast sister, the Giulia Quadrifoglio), on retrospect, it wasn’t bad.\u00a0 Definitely better than all the other SUVs that aren’t made by a company that starts with “P”.\u00a0 It’s just hard to compare race cars with people movers.<\/p>\n Another 4000 pound car that’s interesting is the Kia Stinger.\u00a0 It’s front engine, rear wheel drive.\u00a0 Its Kia’s first full blown performance car.\u00a0 The car looks good.\u00a0 The specs look good.\u00a0 James May likes it.\u00a0 \u00a0 4000 pounds is big and heavy. For anything, really. 4000 pounds of anything is pretty big. I had a Ford C-Max Energi that weighed 4100 pounds. The Energi is a plug in hybrid that has a 20 mile battery in the boot and has a gas engine and tank. Despite being h-e-a-v-y and having the … <\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>Kia may run into the same problem that Volkswagen had with the Phaeton.\u00a0 The Phaeton was a tour de force; it had every option and gadget cars were capable of having.\u00a0 It has a W-12 engine.\u00a0 It was the cousin to the Audi A8.\u00a0 And when it was new, it went for over $100K with options.\u00a0 And that was the problem.\u00a0 “$100K for a VOLKSWAGEN???”\u00a0 Kia has made its name with nice, inoffensive, affordable cars.\u00a0 $52,300 for a Kia???\u00a0 It’s tough going upmarket.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"