In this week's issue:

• Road Test: Angel of the City
• Ford Goes Ballistic with New Lincoln

  Road Test: Angel of the City

You are looking at the indisputable champion of the city streets.

If you're in the market for a budget car for city life, other cars really don't get a look in. If I had to crystallise the Fiat Panda's talents into one phrase, it's that it feels so much bigger than it actually is.

Fiat always used to be master of the small car. From the adorable jelly-mould 500 of the sixties, to the boxy Panda of 1980 to best-selling Uno, Fiat knows small cars. The outgoing Seicento was a creditable if unexceptional city car but it has been swept aside - as have all rivals - by Fiat's new city star in the form of the 21st century Panda.

Five-door cars are rare in the city car class - only the Daewoo Matiz, Daihatsu Charade, Hyundai Getz, Vauxhall Agila, Suzuki Alto and CityRover. The Panda slots in as one of the most compact, yet it boasts bags of interior space.

A Cut Above

Packaging and cabin feel is what the Panda is all about. Sitting in the driver's seat, it really is a cut above everything else. For a start, the design is a delight: modern architecture, light grey plastics rather than bare metal and overall a quality feel totally lacking in most other competitors. Yes, some of the plastic looks a little cheap and some mouldings have clear lines running through them, but for a car at this price level - the 1.2 Dynamic tested is £6,895 - the cabin feels extremely grown-up.

Rear seat space is a little tight, as you might expect from a car of this size. In standard guise, the rear is strictly for two (preferably small) people. A fifth seat belt can be fitted as an option and I'd certainly recommend the sliding split/fold seat option at £200, which frees up more boot space at your whim. Indeed even without the sliding seat, the boot is one of the most generous in this class at 206 litres (or 775 litres with the seats folded) and is very easy to access.

Light as Mousse

I love the dash-mounted gear lever, which falls readily to hand and frees up extra space in the front. It's as light as a spoon in a mousse and superbly easy to engage each gear - brilliant for city traffic.

There are two engine choices, a 54bhp 1.1-litre and a 60bhp 1.2 - the main difference being slightly better performance and slightly better fuel economy from the larger unit (the Panda gets 50.4mpg in the combined fuel cycle). Only consider the 1.1 if budget is paramount - its specification is basic and the 1.2 engine is simply better. It pulls willingly enough, especially at low speeds. Although you'd hardly call it a fast motor, it still feels very at home at motorway cruising speeds, albeit with buzziness and a tendency to be affected by side winds. Better keep to the city streets. I suspect the star of the Panda range, though, will be the 1.3 Multijet diesel seen in the Punto. It arrive later in the year and boast exceptional economy, a great turn of speed and refined manners.

City Mode

The little Panda is also a joy to pilot. It boasts a crisp steering response and confident cornering. Grip is surprisingly strong for such a narrow-tyred and tall-bodied car. For town use, the power steering gets a switch in the dashboard that allows you to enter City mode; this makes the steering much lighter for those tight manoeuvres. Visibility is excellent with one minor quibble: you can't see the nose when parking. But perhaps the Panda's most remarkable quality is the excellence of its ride: in absorbing bumps it is like a latter-day Citroen 2CV. Ride quality like this wouldn't feel out of place on something like a Mondeo, let alone the automotive equivalent of a fidgety baby marmoset.

Prices start as low as £6,295 for the entry-level 1.1 Active, which gets a cassette player, front electric windows, twin airbags and central locking. The 1.2 Dynamic version I tested is £6,895, and gets a rev counter, multi-function trip computer, height-adjustable driver's seatbelt and ABS with Electronic Brake Distribution. If you want extra equipment, best order one of three packs on offer, all adding £600 to the price of the Dynamic. The Sound adds a six-speaker CD system, roof bars, remote locking, electric mirrors and foglamps, while the Air Con self-evidently has air conditioning and the Skydome has a full-length glass roof. There is also an £8,095 luxury model called the Eleganza with alloy wheels, climate control and a split 50/50 rear seat, but this seems a little too swanky for a baby Fiat that is at its best kept simple.

Some cars just seem to gel. The Fiat Panda is one of those. It may seem presumptuous of it that it has ideas above its station. But quite simply it succeeds spectacularly in bringing big-car feel to the very cheapest end of the market. It is a true grown-up in city streets populated by immature, badly-behaved little children.

Written by Chris Rees

  Ford Goes Ballistic with New Lincoln

Ford calls it the right vehicle for the wrong place.

This month, as it moves to capitalise on surging demand for armoured protection since the September 11, 2001, attacks in New York and Washington, Ford will begin offering a "Ballistic Protection Series" version of its Lincoln Town Car.

From the outside it looks deceptively like other Town Cars, the ubiquitous vehicle of choice in the U.S. livery business. But with a price tag starting at $144,995 (79,250 pounds), it's about $100,000 more expensive and features a reinforced body that can withstand rounds from high-powered or high-velocity assault rifles and submachine guns.

It's "an elegant answer to a hostile world," according to a brochure from Ford's luxury Lincoln division. "A barrier against bigger, faster bullets," adds the brochure.

Richard Bondy, a former Secret Service agent who works for Ford, described the rolling fortress to reporters as "a car that has a substantially higher ballistic level" than any other automaker has offered commercially in the United States.

Initially, Ford says it only plans to sell about 300 a year. But Bondy said worldwide sales of armoured cars have grown about 20 percent annually over the past few years, to about 20,000 vehicles. And he and others at Ford clearly see potential beyond 300 sales a year.

At first the car will only be offered in the United States, according to its marketing manage, John Anderson. But he said it would soon be introduced in parts of the Middle East, followed by Mexico, Europe, Asia and elsewhere in Latin America.

Any country facing threats from guerrilla groups, kidnapping, and rampant crime would seem to be fertile ground for the car, and corporate and government clients are likely to give it close consideration alongside armoured models from the likes BMW and the Mercedes division of DaimlerChrysler.

"Security consultants can have a major impact on the sale of this vehicle," Anderson said.

The Lincoln has higher levels of protection than an armoured version of the Cadillac Deville that rival General Motors plans to roll out later this year, and that alone could attract potentially unsavoury customers like mobsters and drug lords.

But Bondy, who sees buyers including everyone from soccer moms to "someone that feels that they have risk because of the kind of business or country that they run," said Ford had no intention of screening people who shop for the vehicle.

"It's just like buying a ballistic vest," he said. "People don't buy armoured product to commit crimes. This is a defensive device." He also rejected stereotypes about individuals interested in such protection..

"The only thing that's consistent is that the people that buy the product want to feel secure and serene travelling through life," Bondy said. The car has run-flat inserts to ensure it can keep moving even when the tires have been shot out. "If somebody's trying to kill you, all you want your car to do is keep trucking," said Bondy.

"They obviously are trying to prey on people's insecurities, which are rampant these days because of the terrorism. and that's their game," said marketing analyst Jack Trout of Connecticut-based Trout & Partners, about Ford's move.

He noted that one can buy "some pretty impressive cars" for the armoured Lincoln's pricetag. "So they're not bullet-proof, but you know what? I'll be going so fast they won't be able to hit me," he joked.

But Michael Robinet, an auto industry analyst at CSM Worldwide in Michigan, said armoured cars made good sense as a niche product for Detroit's embattled automakers.

"Companies like Ford and GM are looking at all facets of the market. They're looking at opportunities ... They may be able to put some heads of state into these types of vehicles."

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