Denver mayor picks a Prius (News)

Sounds like it must be a pre-2004.

Hickenlooper squeezes into tiny car
But hybrid vehicle is a miserly match for thrifty mayor

By Kevin Vaughan, Rocky Mountain News
December 23, 2003

Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper has a new set of wheels.

Again.

These days, you can find Hickenlooper, his security detail and his staff tooling around in a white hybrid-electric Toyota Prius, a low-emission vehicle that has been known to get more than 50 miles per gallon.

And although it's a small car, Hickenlooper - at 6-foot-1 ½ - and his staff have made do just fine.

"We all squeeze into it," said Hickenlooper's spokeswoman, Lindy Eichenbaum Lent. "It's amazing how many people you can squeeze into a Prius if you put your mind to it."

The Prius is Hickenlooper's fifth attempt to replace the Lincoln Town Car favored by his predecessor, Wellington Webb, with a vehicle the city already owns.

Before he'd been in office a month, Hickenlooper had parked the Lincoln with the tinted windows - its lease expired, and it was returned to Ford - and tried several other vehicles:

• A white Ford Explorer from the existing police fleet.

• A white natural-gas-powered Chevrolet Tahoe sport utility vehicle from the existing airport fleet.

• A black Ford Crown Victoria from the existing police fleet.

• A white Dodge Durango sport utility vehicle from the existing police fleet.

• And now the Prius, which was in the fleet at public works.

Hickenlooper, who generally drove his Saturn station wagon or his Aprilia scooter before taking office, said repeatedly on the campaign trail that he would use an environmentally friendly automobile that made financial sense for the city.

But the eclectic Hickenlooper also took a stab at another set of wheels - a 1976 Checker taxi-cab with 86,000 miles on it.

Hickenlooper and his chief of staff, Michael Bennet, tried to buy the vehicle, but the owner decided not to sell.