by Kevin Yue

Created on: August 27, 2009

After reading through a few of the entries for this title, I found the answers given to be unsatisfactory. Before we can decide what the "best highway car" is, there are several factors to consider.

What are you looking for in the car?

Obviously, if you're looking for the "best highway car," you intend to drive on the highway often. You may be required to drive on the highway everyday to work, or you just like going on road trips.

What defines the "best highway car?"

When this term is mentioned, most will picture a larger vehicle full of amenities and luxuries. The ideal highway cruiser should be comfortable, safe, spacious and smooth. For those going on road trips often, more seating capacity and cargo room is also necessary.

With this in mind, the choices are narrowed down to several vehicle types: the SUV/crossover, the estate(wagon), and the sedan.

Power, space, safety, and smoothness. These are several major qualities that are found in most SUVs or crossovers. The crossover is the ideal choice if you need to transport a large amount of people or cargo. These vehicles sit high and ride high, so the view of the road is superior to that of a sedan or estate. With the large size, occupants can feel safer. They ride smooth on the road and there is lots of space to move in the SUV or crossover. Of course, there are drawbacks to the SUV/crossover. For most of the vehicles in this segment, fuel economy is mediocre, and constant stops will be required for fuel if you are driving a long distance. They aren't incredibly manoeuvreable either, passing another car is not as easy as it would be in a smaller car. Let's cross this option off our list.

The sedan is the classic choice - they come in all shapes and sizes to fit our needs. We can have a small sedan such as a Toyota Corolla or something as large as a BMW 760Li.

For this particular situation, we will focus on larger sport sedans. These cars were practically designed for long cruises on the highway at speed. Sport sedans such as the BMW 5-series, Audi A/S6, and the Mercedes-Benz E-class are the leaders in the sport sedan segment. All are well-appointed, luxurious, comfortable and engineered well. These sedans may not offer quite as much cargo space as with an estate, but they are just as safe and nimble.

The estate is the best-all round choice and is at home on the highway, offering all the qualities of the sport sedan while providing more room and sometimes more seating capacity as well. Luckily, the sport sedans mentioned all come in estate form as well.

In the end it comes down to the sedan and the estate. Personally, I prefer the lines of a sport sedan more than the shape of an estate, so I have chosen the BMW 5-series sedan.

There's no better way to weed out the better highway car than by test driving them on the highway. A compact car will feel shaky at speed and will be more swayed by larger vehicles in it's vicinity. A proper sport sedan or estate will feel planted and secure, with plenty of power to pass.

In the end, you can look through the individual qualities listed, and consider for yourself which ones you value the most to find your ideal highway car.

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