Steve Cropley
TUESDAY, WEDNESDAY
Just finished a 700-mile tour of southern Britain shared between two battery-electric vehicles (BEVS) similar in size and price, a VW e-golf and a Hyundai Kona Electric. They were impressive, yet different enough to kill any notion I might have had that in future it’ll be difficult to spot key differences between BEVS (which are all smooth and silent). The Kona is a true game-changer: modern, handsome, comfortable, compact, nice to drive and far better packaged than you expect. It has an honest range of 270 miles, enough for the kind of life I lead, and is thus the first electric car in which I’ve ever been able to relax on a journey. It also has an impressive turn of speed, which the range frees you to use.
Inconveniently, the electric VW turns out to be the finest Golf I’ve driven. And, dynamically, my best electric car. Its blend of compactness, 16in wheels, perfect weight distribution, ideal driving position, superb steering, cushioned ride and amazing refinement over varying surfaces is unique. In many ways, this e-golf is better than cars costing three times as much but its true range of 140 miles just isn’t enough. As things stand, the Kona Electric is the only Uk-available BEV I could want or afford to own. And until a related Kia turns up next year, that’s unlikely to change.
THURSDAY AM
More electric: the killing of the PHEV subsidy seems okay in some ways. We all know people who buy plug-in hybrids to duck taxes, never plug them in, and end up using more (companyfunded) fuel than those with ordinary cars. But you do wonder what on earth our legislators were thinking when it came to timing the subsidy reductions. The car industry, of which ministers seemed so proud, has taken numerous recent shoeings and is currently concerned for its own viability – so they sink the boot in again.
Now BEIS, another governmental arm, is talking about carving eight years off the run-up to the 2040 ban on pure-petrol and diesel cars – while admitting that present infrastructure (and infrastructure planning) isn’t good enough. Such ham-fistedness makes you fear for the efficacy of the decisions these people make in other areas.
THURSDAY PM
I’ve always been full of admiration for Jeremy Clarkson, on the haunted fish tank but especially as a writer. If I could turn a phrase like that, I’d die happy. So I was sorry to see him choose the Lamborghini Huracán Performante as his “personal” car of the year. It struck me as a weirdly old-fashioned choice; part of the need to preserve a larrikin persona, I suppose. He excused himself by describing this unblown 5.2-litre V10 supercar, 200kg heavier than a Mclaren, as “designed by 10-year-olds for showoffs like me” but he knows too much about cars not to realise such machinery is becoming rapidly less relevant. Would love to know his private choice.
The electric VW turns out to be the finest Golf I’ve driven
FRIDAY
Things aren’t going to be too good around here for a while following the departure of our executive editor, Matt Burt, who leaves the old mag after a decade of exceptional service. We’ll miss his Cornish wit and jokery, delivered as he handled the workload of three strong men. The finest headlines and many of the best story ideas of the past decade are his, as is the inspiration for our recent closer connection with early Autocar history. Luckily, Matt stays in the car business, which means we’ll see and hear him from time to time.