L.A. Auto Show: Ford, now sane, delivers 700 miles per tank

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With the biggest crowd of the first day at the L.A. Auto Show gathered around the Ford stand, waiting to see the 2010 Ford Fusion and Fusion Hybrid, music boomed over the public address system:

Yeah I was out of touch / but it wasn’t because I didn’t know enough / I just knew too much ...

There was something fitting about the event’s theme song, ‘Crazy,’ by Gnarls Barkley.

Once the song stopped, North American head Mark Fields explained that though Ford might not have made the kind of cars people wanted to buy in the past, and might have made too many trucks and sport utility vehicles in favor of cars, things were changing. In fact, he insisted, the Fusion is exactly the kind of car people want to drive now. ‘These are challenging times in the industry, but what will power us through, very simply, is great cars.’

Ford’s sales are down 18% this year, so the company apparently hasn’t been making exactly what the consumer hasbeen yearning for up until now. ‘We’ve made tremendous progress in the last few years,’ Fields said.

With Ford’s chief executive in Washington contending his company is nearly as bad off as General Motors and Chrysler, Ford’s messaging might seem, well, a bit crazy. But if the Fusion is as good as Ford promises, it could very well be a step in the right direction. After all, the hybrid gets 39 mpg in the city, and, according to Fields, 700 miles on a tank of gas in city driving.

We at Up To Speed don’t know of too many cars that can get that on two tanks of fuel.

-- Ken Bensinger

For photos of production cars from the L.A. Auto Show, click here.