WHEN DID FAMILY cars stop being for families? When did the kind of car that we all grew up rattling about in the back of stop being big enough? When we were children (all fields round here, etc) our parents had ordinary cars. Cortinas, Sierras, Escorts, Golfs, Carinas. And they were plenty spacious enough.
My wife remembers a time when her mum carried around a family of five kids in a VW Beetle. My own family ran a bright yellow Renault 4 for many years, and if the rear seat was fully occupied, I sat in the boot, on top of the spare wheel.
Actually, I can precisely date the point at which family cars (as they have hitherto been defined) became too small inside to be of any use to a growing family. September 2006. In fact, the rot had set in for some time by then, but September 2006 was the date when legislation was enacted to ensure that your kids had to be in an appropriate child restraint seat until the age of 12, or until they are about 1.5-metres tall.
At a stroke, the entire line-up of Golfs, Focuses, Astras and even the likes of Mondeos, Passats and Avensis were rendered useless, if you had more than two children. Why? Because child seats and booster seats won’t fit three across the back of a conventional car. Even in such large, supposedly family-friendly fare as a Mondeo, you will struggle to get, for instance, a forward-facing seat, a booster cushion and a rear-facing seat in at the same time. Kids may be small but their safety kit isn’t.
It’s worse again if you try to mix adult passengers and child seats. Back when I had just the one small person to worry about. I tried to go out for the day using a BMW X3, into which were squeezed my wife, her parents and my son. It was just impossible. You would think that a decent-sized SUV like that, aimed at well-heeled families, would get such basics right, but no. Shoulder room was ridiculously light and no-one could find their seatbelt buckles without much groping and fidgeting.
I spoke to Tony Kealy’s, the well known car seat and buggy suppliers who agreed that, when it comes to taking three car seats “it’s mainly the people carrier type vehicles that’ll do it. The likes of the Ford S-Max and that. Some of the larger saloons might do the trick, but it does come down to the type of seat. Some booster seats can be a little narrower, so you might be able to squeeze three of them in.”
But a more expensive car, a BMW or Mercedes, perhaps? “No. You’ll never get three across in the back in a BMW or anything like it.”
It’s not just that child seats are getting bulkier though. I spoke to Marianne Särnå from the Volvo Cars Safety Centre in Sweden and asked her if safety gizmos are stealing the space that we used to have: “In a Volvo car more or less everything is, and has always been, designed with safety in mind, which sometimes takes space from the compartment but also sometimes creates space.
“Looking at side collisions where you only have 30-40cm distance between the intruding car and your own, it is important to create space for the occupant, which can be done with help from a strong side structure and safety systems such as SIPS, side airbags and inflatable curtains. What mainly makes the impression of a car’s interior being smaller or more compact today is the design of the car and enhanced comfort; the angle of windscreen and rear design, height of car, fluffy, comfortable seats with integrated safety systems, more comfortable rear seats, which take space, etc. Doors are not much thicker today but they are padded which improves safety.”
Boot space is also an issue. Most family hatchbacks, such as a VW Golf or Ford Focus, have a boot capacity of about 450 litres. Sounds big, and it even looks big. Now try loading that space with a big three-wheel Phil Teds buggy. A travel cot. A nappy bag. A bag of toys. Not much room left for your own bags, or anything else for that matter. If you have but the one child, then a Golf or Focus will just about do you these days. If you have two, it’s going to be a real squeeze. More than two? Forget it.
It seems that the only recourse is to go for the kind of car that the infamous Jeremy Clarkson once called “the motoring equivalent of a vasectomy”. You’re going to have to buy an MPV. Pop your head into the back of the likes of an Opel Zafira or Citroen C4 Picasso and you’ll immediately see three individual rear seats, just waiting for an appropriate child restraint system to be fitted. And if you’re not using the third row of seats, the boots are generally pretty massive, so no issues in terms of squeezing in buggies.
There are pitfalls though. If you are a driving enthusiast, then having an MPV is pretty much like being the waking dead. You can still feel and experience, but of joy or happiness, there is none. Okay, so the Ford S-Max is nice to drive and the new Opel Zafira Tourer is pretty decent too, but these are expensive cars, with prices well north of €30,000 once you start adding a few options. How many families surviving the recession do you know can afford that?
Even if you do plump for an MPV, you may not be getting the space you think you are. Take the Citroen C4 Picasso (or its cousin, the Peugeot 5008) for instance. As noted earlier, it has three individual rear seats, which is great. But the overall width of the cabin is no more than that of a conventional hatchback, so although three child seats might fit, if you start trying to put adult passengers in there too, you’re going to run into shoulder room issues again.
Still, I think I have found a solution. It’s one that most people have forgotten about, and it suits my 1980s throwback persona down to the ground. A 1990 Mercedes E-Class estate with rear-facing child seats in the boot. Think about it: classic Mercedes build quality, unimpeachable image, decent driving experience, all the space and safety you could reasonably ask for and, best of all, you’ll pick one up for under €2,000 if you shop around. The perfect family car?
