2010 Mazdaspeed 3: What's a Station Wagon?

Such a sad day to see a generation not know about station wagons. I hope you'll give her a history lesson about a time when we didn't need to turn to truck-based, massively-tall, relatively inefficient SUVs, or even "mini" vans to cart around up to eight people (rear-facing third-row seats with a bench in front and center) in relative comfort, or fold down those seats and still have a cargo compartment big enough to haul a 4'x8' sheet of plywood, or even tow a trailer when called upon. Instead, we had these marvelous things called station wagons.

+1 travelingman79

Compared to the modern vehicles with "Utility" in their name the old wagons really did have a ton of utility.

Can't have 'wagon' anywhere near the name of a modern car. Heck hatchbacks are just finally starting to get some respect thanks to cars like the GTI and MS3. Hatchbacks are seen more as fun now than 'cheap transportation' like they had been for years.

Hmm.. I could see how a hatchback and a station wagon are similar. You should try showing her old pictures of an Oldsmobile Cutlass station wagon that my friends mom used to have. I swear I was probably like 8, the 90s was a good decade. Or maybe you can show her pictures of Volvo's station wagons. Even though the MS3 could be considered a station wagon on 'roids its considered a sporty 4-door hatch (i guess it's cause of the 4 doors that give it the wagon look). What about Subaru's Outback? The line between wagon/hatchback is skewed these days. I like it.

Volvo still makes wagons (the V50 and the V70) and actually calls them wagons.

VW makes the Jetta Sportwagen and the Passat Wagon and calls them as such. BMW also offers the 3 series in a "Sport Wagon".

In addition to the Volvos mentioned above, these are the only vehicles marketed as wagons on the US market that I can currently think of.

Kelly, does your daughter know what a shooting brake is? That would be impressive.

I always chuckle at the mental gymnastics people go through in trying to make small 4-door wagons fit into a hatchback category so they don't have to admit they drive a station wagon.

I think the definition of a station wagon is simple: A 3 or 5 door hatchback which has the SAME overall length as the sedan version.

The MS3, and most 5 doors, have chopped off rears that greatly reduce "utility" For instance, the new Fiesta: The hatchback is a full 12 inches shorter than the sedan, and it costs more than the sedan-- for less car, in my opinion. 12 inches is a lot to lop off of an already very small car. Plus, which Fiesta would you rather be in when you get rear ended? What crazy rule says this must be so?

And +1 to travelingman79

what about cars that don't have a sedan version?

also the differences between crash tests on hatches vs sedans are marginal

+1 travelingman79

My dad owned two taurus wagons and one of them actually had the rear facing third row, I have a soft spot for wagons because of that. I really hope Kia do make an Optima wagon and price it like a sedan (under 20k for a large wagon), they would be selling lots of those because they would be in the segment on their own.

""An Avant," she said, getting impatient with the conversation."

Somewhere in Germany right now, Audi's marketing guy in 1996 just stood up victorious and declared "I did it!"

@lostboyz: There are few real station wagons out there, but I can't think of one that doesn't have a sedan counterpart

Audi A4
BMW 3 and 5
Hyundai Elantra (kind of)
VW Jetta and Passat
Mercedes?
Suzuki Forenza?

Perhaps the Volvo station wagons don't have direct sedan counterparts, I don't know enough about them.

I may have forgotten some wagons, but there really aren't many out there.

I did a write-up of this very topic on my now-neglected blog, wagonfan.com. To this day, it's the post that gets the most hits across all my sites.

http://wagonfan.com/?p=5

+1 travelingman79
+1 jriz

A sad day indeed. Wagons can be the ultimate sleeper. M5 Touring or RS6 Avant anyone? I'll take either over an X6M.

Love the look of the MS3 in red from that angle!

Hatchback, 5-door hatch, wagon, crossover... it's all marketing speak anyways and makes no difference IMO. The MS3 looks like a small wagon but let's call it a 4-door hatchback because it sounds more hip ;-)

What the blazes? The MS3 is a station wagon. So is the Audi A4 Avant, the 328xi, Edge, Flex, Explorer, Terrain, Suburban, Highlander, RX370, etc, etc.

They may have other names but they're still station wagons.

As a child of the Country Squire, this saddens me, but I'm not at all surprised. "Station wagon" is a defunct term, replaced by "crossover", "SUV" and "minivan" in our current lexicon. It's all just semantics, but so is everything else.

It's a station wagon, so is a Ford Explorer, so is a Chevy Suburban...they are all. Just different sizes.

Oh sorry, blueguydotcom beat me to it, and he said it better.

travelingman79 is a +4. Nice.

My wife abhors "hatchbacks", so when I told her that the Eclipse she drove at the time was a hatchback, she was more than a little incredulous. The difference between a hatchback/wagon and a sedan/coupe is that they have no trunk. The difference between a hatchback and a wagon, then, is the slope of the rear glass. Fairly upright, it's a wagon. Not, it's a hatchback.

But. I generally consider crossovers "wagons", mostly because I think the term "crossover" is stupid.

Personally I always refer to my Forester as a wagon. Subaru wants to call it an SUV, but I'm not buying it.

I can't believe she's already 10 years old. Good lord, where does the time go?
--Bryn

"As a child of the Country Squire..."

Wow, that's a funny name for any sort of vehicle!

Just to chime in again... I don't consider the Flex/Aclaverse/Highlander etc. wagons any more than I do truck-based SUVs like the Suburban/Tahoe/Expedition. The wagons I'm thinking of are based on cars with something different than a trunk in back. That is, they're the same as the car version to the B pillars at least. And they don't have a 4" taller ride/step in height than the sedan version, either. Think Escort wagon, Camry wagon, and Caprice/Roadmaster wagon to give S/M/L examples. Hatchbacks are hatchbacks, not wagons; even my MkIV GTI whose "hatchback" was nearly vertical was not a wagon. I like the definition ed124c gave earlier - it has to have the same length, at least, as the sedan version.

Oh, what I'd pay for an Audi RS wagon.

carlisimo says:
12:27 PM, 08/20/10

"'As a child of the Country Squire...'

Wow, that's a funny name for any sort of vehicle!"

Man, wagons had the best names! None of this namby-pamby alphanumerical horseshat. No sir! Country Squire, Vista Cruiser, Yeoman, Parklane, Parisienne Safari, Westchester... I could go on and on. Oh! Nomad, too! The coolest wagon with the coolest name of all time.

Your daughter is awesome. I hope to have conversations like that with my future kid someday in my Speed3.

When I think station wagon, I think of Woodie's, Buick Roadmaster Estate, or Volvo 240- something unquestionably a station wagon rather than a mildly stretched 2door hatchback fitted with an extra pair of doors. Something where the rear doors and front doors are the same size. Something where the tail is a door and allows you to open the window or the tailgate separately. Something where there is a tremendous amount of body and trunk overshooting the rear axel.

Regarding the Mazda 3 5door and 4door- The Sedan is 3" longer than the Hatch.

Around old people, I tell them I drive a turbo wagon. Everyone else knows it as the happy hatchback.

Year ago an auto designer told me the difference between a wagon and hatchback is the extra side window.

i.e. a 5 door Golf is a hatchback but the Mazda3 would be a wagon.

It's kinda blurred these days but it's still what I go by.

We still have our Taurus wagon, and as long as there is some affordable wagon to be had we'll take that. CUVs just seem so needless.

I always do the "Who's Parker Stevenson" test with my interns. Always worth a chuckle or two, especially if you drop in a "Who is Shaun Cassidy?" for added measure. What's a wagon....ha.