That's an interesting question. The CVPI is designed for police work,
of course - it's fairly rugged and comes with police-relevant options
available. But it does suck down gas - probably mpg is low-20's?

Note that the UK Escorts were quite different from the US ones for
many model years, despite the similar name. (OTOH, the UK Mondeo was
very much like the US Contour despite the different names - that's
Ford for you.)

Right. For city driving, if you're still thinking about Ford, I'd
consider looking in the longer term at, say, the 2008 Ford Fusion,
which you should be able to get with a hybrid-electric powertrain and
all-wheel drive, so you might get decent traction and reasonable city
efficiency. (I figure municipal police are already used to wrangling
good deals out of Ford.)

In the meantime, I wonder if something like the Saturn Ion might not
be too bad. Fuel efficiency is high-20's and the plastic body panels
might be useful (I'm guessing police cars can get banged up a bit),
and they have some turbocharged ones if the regular aren't speedy
enough.

If it's politically acceptable for you to buy non-NAFTA-made imports,
and you're okay with pretty small cars, I'd look at things like the
Honda Civic Hybrid and Toyota's smaller cars. My main criticism of the
CVPI for police work was that it's only two-wheel drive, and you can
sure get some decent snow in Ottawa, but the only really fuel
efficient cars in the North American market are two-wheel drive, at
least that I know of - unless you Canadians have something I didn't
know about.

I might be guessing your preferences completely wrongly. Feel free to
tell us more about what you're looking for in a car.

-- Mark

Well, in the UK *some* police drive something like an Escort. There
is, unlike the U.S., a definite hierarchy of police vehicles. At the
bottom are what I believe are called "panda cars", which are models
like Fiesta, Escort, etc., with no special performance. These are used
for in-town tasks and routine patrols. At the top, Jaguar used to be
the choice for high-speed pursuit use, and only officers who met
specific training and experience requirements are allowed to drive
such vehicles. It was claimed that high-speed pursuit in the city
required a level of skill and concentration comparable to that needed
for Grand Prix racing.  Motorway patrol used to be dominated by, of
all things, the Range Rover.  There are other rungs of the ladder, of
course.

This reminds me of the 1970's in Ann Arbor, Michigan. The county
sheriff used Chrysler intermediates (Plymouth Satellite?) with the 440
engine.  The city police used the same vehicle, but with the 360
small-block engine.  The sheriff's comment was to the effect that
"that's OK if you just want to cruise around giving parking tickets",
in an obvious dig at the city cops.

Around here, the Dodge Intrepid, which seems to be out of
production. The officers preferred it to the Chevy Impala on interior
room, it seems.

If you can divide tasks, you could get, perhaps, Civics or Focuses
(Foci?)  for the more mundane, but something a bit bigger when
suspects need transport, etc. Perhaps one of the quasi-sport-utes like
an Aztek (ugly, but apparently functional) or a Ford Freestyle. Going
to a real SUV like an Expedition or Yukon gets you into a vehicle
heavier than the Crown Vic.