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" On-Sale Date: spring Price (base): $23,295 Competitors: Chevy Equinox, GMC Terrain, Honda CR-V, Toyota RAV4, Hyundai Tucson, Mazda CX-5, VW Tiguan Powertrain: 2.5-liter inline four, 168 hp, 170 lb-ft; 1.6-liter turbocharged I-4, 178 hp, 184 lb-ft; 2.0-liter turbocharged I-4, 240 hp, 270 lb-ft Fuel Economy (city/highway, 1.6-liter): 23/33 (estimated) What&amp;#039;s New: Compact crossovers are a hot segment, and after an 11-year run, Ford&amp;#039;s Escape was due for a revamp. The 2013 Escape rides a version of the Ford Focus platform, dubbed C1, though it&amp;#039;s a good bit larger: The length is up by 3.5 inches, the wheelbase has been stretched by 2.8 inches, and it&amp;#039;s slightly wider. That added room helps for hauling people and stuff. You&amp;#039;ll find a little more than an inch of increased legroom in the back seat and around 3 more cubic feet of cargo capacity. Under the hood, you&amp;#039;ll have a choice of three engines. The base Escape gets the 2.5-liter, normally aspirated four-cylinder from the old rig. But we recommend the upgrade to one of the two turbocharged four-cylinder engines\u2014a 1.6-liter EcoBoost with 178 hp or the 2.0-liter EcoBoost with a full 240 hp and 270 lb-ft of torque. That&amp;#039;s the same horsepower and even more torque than the old 3.0-liter V-6 could produce. Every engine comes paired to a six-speed automatic. There&amp;#039;s no manual-transmission option, and the hybrid model is gone from the menu.   Although the old hybrid Escape delivered better city fuel economy than the 2013 version, the new 1.6-liter engine clobbers it on the highway with an estimated 33 mpg, thanks in part to grill shutters that close at freeway speeds to improve aerodynamics. Overall, Ford says, the new Escape is about 10 percent more aerodynamic than the outgoing model, and it&amp;#039;s still available with all-wheel drive.  Tech Tidbit: The Escape&amp;#039;s intelligent all-wheel-drive system gathers data from wheel-speed sensors, accelerator-pedal sensors, and steering-wheel-angle sensors. Ford says it can preemptively split the torque between the axles through an electomagnetic clutch. So in situations where oversteer or understeer are about to happen, the all-wheel-drive system can divert torque to where it&amp;#039;s needed. Ford says these torque adjustments can happen within 16 milliseconds. Driving Character: The Escape, which will be sold as the Kuga in Europe, isn&amp;#039;t a world vehicle that&amp;#039;s been dumbed down for our roads. According to chief engineer Eric Loeffler, the only real difference in handling between the European Kuga and our Escape is the tires. European buyers prefer the higher grip of summer tires, but we apparently prefer the compromise of an all-season tire.  No matter. The Escape handles well, with quick steering and little body roll\u2014for a crossover. This is one ute that would be at home slithering down the twistiest portions of California&amp;#039;s Pacific Coast Highway. If your daily grind includes more potholes than smooth pavement, you might find the Escape&amp;#039;s ride a tad stiff. But for most drives, you&amp;#039;ll gladly accept some bumps and jiggles for that flat cornering. We found the 2.0-liter Escape Titanium with its large 19-inch tires and additional 200 pounds of heft (thanks to the all-wheel drive) to be the smoother ride and better handler.  On paper, the 1.6-liter EcoBoost sounds like it would be underpowered for a 3500-pound vehicle. But in reality, this little engine does an excellent job moving the Escape. It&amp;#039;s only when you need a bootful of throttle to pass a slow-moving truck that you&amp;#039;ll wish for the larger 2.0-liter engine. Either engine requires the six-speed to shift a lot more frequently than a larger displacement engine would. But lugging the gear lever down to &amp;quot;Sport&amp;quot; minimizes this gear hunting. The Escape then holds a gear better and even fires off downshifts when you need them.  This bigger motor transforms the Escape into a little hot rod. It&amp;#039;s quite a lot of fun to pitch a 2.0-liter Escape into a corner and let the all-wheel-drive system sort out the power and pull you through without any drama or tire scrub. It&amp;#039;s easy to hustle this Escape around town. We can&amp;#039;t wait to see what this snappy 2.0-liter EcoBoost powertrain does for the lighter Focus, when Ford brings the high performance ST version over to the U.S.  The view from the front seats is a combination of Focus and Explorer. The fat steering wheel and gauges seem to be lifted right from the Focus, and that&amp;#039;s no bad thing. The materials around the interior are all fairly soft and upscale. We spent the day in a midlevel $29,840 SE model with cloth seats; aside from lacking the features of the high-end Titanium model such as heated-leather seats, activeparking assist, and blind-spot warning, the SE was no less refined or comfortable, and it packed seats that wore an upscale fabric. Climb into the back and you&amp;#039;ll find a rear seat that reclines and provides plenty of legroom. (Although for taller riders, headroom could get tight.) Reclining the seat surely helps but can cut into the luggage space. The seat cushions of this split-folding bench seem thin, so only a road trip will uncover their comfort level over the long haul. Favorite Detail: The Escape&amp;#039;s optional hands-free power liftgate is one of the smartest features to hit the market in some time. No longer must you fumble for your key fob with an armload of groceries or shopping bags to hit the button and get the tailgate to open. The Escape takes care of everything as long as it can sense that you have the fob in your pocket. Just gently kick your foot between the two sensors in the middle of the bumper and the liftgate opens\u2014and closes when you are all done loading. Smart. Driver&amp;#039;s Grievance: Where&amp;#039;s the Escape-ness? It seems odd that Ford would remake a vehicle as successful as the Escape and not retain some styling characteristics of the old vehicle. The old one was upright and blocky, but it was good-looking in a rugged sort of way. This new one is sleek and we dig it. But there&amp;#039;s nothing that says &amp;quot;Escape&amp;quot; in the exterior design except for the badges.   Bottom Line: The new Escape finally delivers a modern small crossover to the Ford family. It&amp;#039;s certainly one of the sharpest looking vehicles in this price class, and when equipped with one of the EcoBoost engines, the Escape is a fun and practical ute. Ford made sure every model of Escape hits at least 30 mpg on the highway, which should be a major trump card when gas prices spike. And should you need the capability, 2.0-liter models with a trailer-towing package can haul around 3500 pounds\u2014better than most in this class. If you&amp;#039;re hungry for a hybrid Escape, Ford says they&amp;#039;ll offer the upcoming 2013 C-Max\u2014a smaller five-door wagon\u2014in both hybrid and Energi (plug-in) configurations. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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