Personally, this car is not my style, but I know it appeals to a certain segment, in addition to its main market as a cop car and taxicab. I know that Car&Driver was unimpressed. They were commenting on the Mercury Marauder version which is supposed to be more "sporty" than the Crown Vic -- yet it cannot keep up wiht plain-jane family sedans like Honda Accord and Nissan Altima, both of which do 0-60 in well under 7 seconds and have handling comparable to the European brands. And to be honest, having ridden in lots of Ford taxicabs I can say that it's really not all that roomy in the back, relative to the huge size of the car -- thanks to its inefficient non-independent rear suspension design, the interior really suffers due to the huge transmission and driveshaft tunnel infringing on the space.
Seems like a car in need of modernizing. If you're not in a hurry, I'd consider waiting to commit until you see the newly redesigned full sized sedans Chrysler is coming out with in spring 2004. They will be replacing the Intrepid, 300M, Concorde class cars with rear wheel drive cars that have modern architecture and share suspension platforms with the Mercedes E-class cars. V8s will be available. Sounds like they could be a knockout. Heres an excerpt from July 28th Automotive News:
Full-sized, rear-drive models
Adios, cab forward. The rear-drive 300C sedan concept represents the new styling direction for the Chrysler brand. The production car debuts for the 2005 model year.
It has been more than 15 years since Chrysler and Dodge fielded a line of high-volume, rear-wheel-drive cars. The last batch was sold primarily as police cars and taxis. Next year, the brands likely will offer four rwd models wearing new nameplates, and those cars will have a lot in common with the prestigious Mercedes E class.
The Chrysler group is gambling that with the improvements it has made in the traction and stability control of rwd cars, buyers in the Snow Belt won't miss the more sure-footed grip of front-wheel drive. It's a big bet since the most popular sedans in the country last year, the fwd Toyota Camry and Honda Accord, accounted for 833,125 sales combined.
The rwd replacements for the Chrysler Concorde and 300M and Dodge Intrepid sedans debut in the spring of 2004 as 2005 models. The full-sized models will wear fresh names to attract new buyers. Dodge also will offer a wagon. The company is expected to adopt the names featured this year on two concepts: the Dodge Magnum wagon and Chrysler 300C sedan. Those concepts closely resemble the production models.
The rwd cars signal how components will be shared among automakers. For example, the automatic transmission and electrical architectures will evolve from the Mercedes-Benz E class. Ditto for the design of the multilink rear suspension, although the Chrysler and Dodge versions will have different springs and shock absorbers than the E class.
If Chrysler stays true to the 300C concept, the production vehicle's wheelbase will be 7 inches longer than that of the 2004 300M, and the car will be 1 inch shorter.
The automaker also is working to differentiate more strongly a Chrysler's exterior and interior styling from that of a Dodge.