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As 4x4 owners tire of having to don a false beard and sunglasses every time they get behind the wheel of their 'gas-guzzlers', manufacturers have been racing to introduce a 4WD which doesn't instantly demonise its owner. Some are almost there - not all 4x4s available today stick two fingers up at the environment. And with the Kuga, Ford has made it across the finishing line ahead of the pack.
The Kuga is a crossover vehicle, blurring the boundaries between car and off-roader and generally doing a rather good job of it. It's reassuringly beefier than the smaller 4WDs typically seen in the staff car parks of hairdressing salons, but it won't scare the hell out of you when it drives up behind you on the motorway. It's a funky-looking car with, crucially, class-leading low emissions: 169g/km, which sneak it under the wire into class E for road tax (£170) for 2008/9 and class H thereafter. That may not be low enough to put it onto the company car list for Friends of the Earth, but it should mean that your environmentally-aware kids don't ask you to drop them off round the corner from school any more. And the 44.1 combined mpg makes it tricky for strangers at dinner parties to accuse you of being single-handedly responsible for shrinking the polar ice-cap.
Based on Ford's acclaimed Focus and C-Max platform, the Kuga has good bones. And, while it can't rival the Focus for sheer driving enjoyment, it's not exactly a struggle to travel around in. It's good fun - a nice, high driving position, a comfortable ride and responsive, agile handling. All-round vision isn't brilliant, though, and you need to be particularly careful when reversing.
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