The Pacifica will command more market share in a segment now dominated by the Toyota Sienna and the Honda Odyssey.Fast facts
– Model: 2017 Chrysler Pacifica Limited – Exterior color: Velvet Red Pearl – Interior color: Black and Alloy – Engine: 3.6-liter, six-cylinder – Horsepower: 287 – Transmission: 9-speed automatic – Fuel economy: 28 mpg highway, 18 mpg city – Local Dealer: Crown Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep, Ram of Chattanooga – Price (as tested): $48,475
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Perhaps the anti-minivan movement has run its course.
For people who were kids in the 1980s and 1990s, minivans conjure childhood memories. As late as the year 2000, there were about a million minivans a year sold in the United States.
But just because minivans were once the preferred mode of family transportation, doesn’t mean today’s young moms and dads inherited the impulse. For going on two decades, the pendulum has swung away from minivan ownership toward SUVs and crossovers, which emphasize ruggedness over spaciousness, flintiness over functionality.
Detroit virtually invented the minivan segment in 1984 with the Dodge Caravan and Chrysler Town and Country. And now Chrysler is hoping to re-invigorate the market for minivans with the brand-new Pacifica, a sharp-looking family hauler which can transport seven or eight passengers in high style.
While a full-fledged minivan renaissance may never happen, we’re betting that the Pacifica will at least command more market share in a segment now dominated by the Toyota Sienna and the Honda Odyssey. At any rate, Chrysler has bet the farm on the Pacifica and will soon be retiring its other minivan models.
Our tester, in racy Velvet Red Pearl paint, is a top-of-the-line Limited model that lists for $48,475. There are five Pacifica trim levels, with a base LX starting at $28,595.
STYLING AND FEATURES
The Pacifica may be the best-looking example of minivan design ever. Its smooth, aerodynamic shape manages to create visual excitement, which is hard to do when the basic architecture of a mini-van has all the charm of a breadbox.
Minivans, by definition, are more about function than aesthetics, but Chrysler has managed to produce a minivan that is more than just a cube on wheels. Our Pacifica tester has a chiseled front third and 20-inch alloy wheels that give it an aggressive stance. By comparison, early minivans had Matchbox car-size wheels with thick sidewalls.
Strips of low-hanging chrome sharpen the horizontal lines of the Pacifica, and perhaps the world’s largest, three-panel sun roof give the minivan a green-house-on-wheels vibe. Our tester has an attractive two-tone interior – black and alloy (light gray). The leather seats are set off with contrasting, dark-brown piping.
Among the neat new features on the Pacifica are foot-activated power side doors. If you have your hands full with, say, a baby stroller, just wave a foot under the rocker panel and the sliding side door automatically opens.
Inside are more surprises. The “Stow and Go” second-row seats fold and tuck neatly into floor compartments for those times when you need to trade seating for more cargo area. To pick up stray Skittles, there’s a built-in vacuum system.
On the back of the front seats are 10-inch video monitors connected to a Blu-Ray DVD system. There are also HDMI inputs to handle video games and movies streamed from your tablet computers and smartphones.
The interior of the Pacifica is several rungs above the old Town and Country minivan. The perforated leather seats in our tester are heated and cooled. Up front, part of the center stack has been removed to create a flat floor, opening up the cockpit.
The dash is home to an 8.4-inch touch screen display which is the command center of Chrysler’s easy-to-use Uconnect telematics system. It’s also the display for a sharp back-up camera and fancy 360-degree surround view camera.
A new, rotary-style shifter is positioned in the center of the dash, reducing clutter even more. The two-tone, leather-covered steering wheel is among the beefiest we’ve ever gripped.
Other features include three-zone climate control and a 13-speaker sound system driven by a 506-watt amplifier.
DRIVING IMPRESSIONS
The Pacifica is powered by a 286-horsepower, six-cylinder engine mated to a nine-speed automatic transmission. The 9-speed is increasingly a Chrysler trademark and leads to better fuel economy. We did notice that in mountain driving the transmission hunted for gears and had to occasionally be spurred to downshift.
Overall, though, ride quality is a strength of the Pacifica. The cabin is quiet and the suspension soaks up bumps and ruts. Visibility is excellent and hip and shoulder room is voluminous.
Our 9-year-old son had a blast using the built-in vacuum system to clean up the carpet after I picked him up from soccer practice. The second row captain’s seats are built for comfort, and the third row legitimately has room for three.
The government says to expect fuel economy of 28 miles per gallon in highway driving and 18 miles per gallon city.
BOTTOM LINE
The Pacifica has the design flair and refinement to be competitive among modern minivans, and might just be the spark needed to energize the whole segment.
Contact Mark Kennedy at mkennedy@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6645. Follow him on Twitter @TFPCOLUMNIST. Subscribe to his Facebook updates at www.facebook.com/mkennedycolumnist.