Ford tries to escape the ordinary
Don’t expect the last word in nimble responses, because this is a relatively heavy machine at 1777kg; but it feels confident.
You experience a bit more fussiness in the secondary ride than with the standard car, but the ST Line is still a comfortable family SUV for urban driving.
Sporty ST Line bits aside, this model is closer to the mid-level Trend than the top Titanium. You get the crucial safety stuff like autonomous braking (now standard on all Escapes) and blindspot monitoring, plus a few fancy touches like automated parking. But there’s no adaptive cruise or HID headlights like you get on the Titanium.
The seats are manual (no hardship, we like them better that way) but so is the tailgate; again, you only get the gesture-activated door on the top Titanium.
Is that Model T black?
Hilarious. Black on black on black doesn’t always work on cars, but we reckon it suits the Escape ST Line rather well.
However, there is a choice of more cheerful hues if you want. No matter what the body colour, you still get the black wheels, grille, foglight borders, window surrounds and roof rails.
Other cars to consider?
The Escape ST Line has carved out a nice little niche for itself. There are plenty of good-to-drive medium SUVs out there, but nothing in the mainstream market that combines this kind of power with a specifically sporting focus to make it a bit special.
To get something similar in concept and execution you have to look to the Volkswagen Tiguan R-Line ($68,990) or perhaps Seat Ateca FR ($50,900). The Escape ST Line might lack a little polish in some respects compared with those high achievers, but at $39,990 it looks like an absolute (black) bargain.