Kia e-Niro
Award-winner is a champ with Steve, too
WITH the Kia e-Niro’s regular custodian, Vicky Parrott, away on holiday, I took the opportunity to grab hold of the keys and spent a couple of weeks seeing what all the fuss is about with our award-winning EV.
If you’ve still got doubts about the viability of electric cars, the DrivingElectric 2019 Car of the Year could well be the model to extinguish them. Even putting the powertrain aside for a moment, you’ve got a roomy compact SUV with space for adults in the rear and a respectable boot, too.
I think the interior lacks a little of the polish and design flair you might get in some other £33,000 cars, but the amount of equipment fitted to this First Edition model impressed me. There are also some really well thoughtout storage options, such as the phone shelf positioned low at the base of the dash that keeps your USB cable out of the way, and the covered cup-holders in the centre console.
Amazingly, the 295-mile range quoted by the dashboard display after a full charge turned out to be closer to the truth than I expected before getting behind the wheel this week, and the near-silent running made my commute so much more serene and enjoyable, too.
The biggest surprise for me, though, came on faster B-roads, where the e-Niro can actually be good fun. While I know electric cars are generally nippy, I found the way the Kia steers and grips through a corner then squirts you up the road to the next bend surprisingly enjoyable. The one downside is the way the body tends to lean and pitch, something I didn’t notice in town or on the motorway.
This little crossover is probably a better standard-bearer for electric cars generally than lots of models costing twice the price.