MCC Smart Passion cabrio

Auto Express Car Reviews

By Mike Askew

March 2002

Remember those wonderful visions of the 21st century that programmes like Tomorrow's World used to amaze us with? For those too young or too forgetful to recall them, the best ones had images of strange looking people eating pills instead of food, going to the moon for their holidays and moving around towns and cities in tiny pod-like vehicles.
Well, it's 2002 and almost every one of those predictions has gone awry. Except one. Take a look around any British city and it won't be long before you clap eyes on a Smart - arguably the nearest thing we're going to get to personal urban transportation. Despite DaimlerChrysler's early reservations that the tiny two-seater would be too radical for British tastes, the German giant finally got its act together late last year with the arrival of its new right-hand-drive model.
Over the next six months I'll be running a cabrio version to see just how practical and user-friendly it is over a realistic period of time. It remains to be seen whether the novelty will wear off at the first prospect of a slog up the M1 on a wet Monday morning. Only time will tell.
For now, however, the Smart is still the darling of the fleet. Those who have sampled its sheer parkability around town have returned praising its compact proportions and cheeky jam-busting antics.
As an owner of an early LHD model, I've already noticed that the driving position isn't as good on our right-handed long termer. For some reason the driver's seat is mounted higher than the passenger's, and the pedals have an odd set-up with the brake being floor-hinged while the throttle is hinged at the top.
That said, the Smart does what it was designed to do extremely well. The cabrio has averaged 54.1mpg to date, with the promise of more to come once it breaks free of stop/start town driving. The build quality is also very high and the general standard of plastics and trim is well beyond what you'd expect in a 10 grand car.
Downsides? Well the bike carrier on the back of the car prevents the boot from opening and will be despatched to the garage rafters until the weather is more suitable for cycling, while the plastic rear screen gets covered in road muck easily and obscures rearward vision, so you have to rely on your wing mirrors.
However neither problem is serious enough to take the edge off an impressive debut. Here's hoping for better weather and a chance to use the car to its full potential. I'll keep you posted.