At the moment, my department uses the Utility Interceptor for supervisors and the Sedan for everyone else. We would like to move everyone to SUVs because they’re roomier and more comfortable than the sedans and the price difference is negligible. The problem is that all of our purchasing goes through the county commissioners, and they won’t approve it because the SUVs give the impression of being more expensive. So there’s that...
Chargers and Explorers for the Local Police here, Sheriff is charger and tahoe, state troopers also tahoe and charger (and they are less conspicuously silver/grey with not a lot of markings) a few crown vics in raleigh but not many the surrounding burbs I havent seen any
Locally they use CVs or Chargers. At a guess, Chargers are dirt cheap compared to Explorers.
The simple answers are budget and fuel economy.
Budget: Not only are the sedans usually slightly cheaper, they require less aftermarket equipment. If you want to keep people in the back seat, you disable the locks and handles and put a partition behind the front seats. To do the same in an SUV, you have to add another partition behind the rear seat to keep them out of the cargo area, especially since you probably added a big storage box for goodies back there too.
Fuel economy: Not only does gas cost money, some departments have fuel economy targets they need to hit (or appear to be trying to hit). This has led some forces to branch out and buy Toyotas, Nissans, or in one case that I know of, Smart Cars (!), although for the most part I would just expect to see more hybrid Police vehicles from the big three in the future. LAPD has a berkeleying Tesla, although I suspect that they only roll it out for promotional purposes.
Spare tire TPMS: Some of the Police stuff has to pass a high speed rear impact test, and an inflated spare tire can actually be the difference between passing and failing.
Non-chipped keys: I believe there's an option for a "fleet key" so that all of the vehicles can use the same key, assuming you order from Ford.
pinchvalve said:Our local PD is mostly using the Explorer, but also a quad-cab F-150. What's up with that?
Fleet models can be had relatively cheap. Since the cheapest of Suburbans has still become pretty expensive we've been replacing ours with stripped down Silverado crew cabs and Durangos.
Tacticool? Washington and its surrounding counties would however like to thank the rest of America for all the cash to buy these goodies. No cop hate here. Roommate just retired again recently. 
Most of the towns here are running old P71 Crown Vics or Explorers. Every once in a while, you'll see a Charger or an AWD Taurus, but those numbers are dwindling. I haven't seen a Caprice PPV (or whatever its called) around here used as a police car. All of the ones I've seen are in private hands.
My town has a mix of Explorers, P71's, and a handful of Taurii (Tauruses, whatever). They have like 3 different liveries too, which is extra confusing.
The MA State Police almost exclusively run Explorers now. They also have exactly one 1980's Corvette. 
By me most of the police vehicles are Vitaras, with a few crappy base Lancers thrown in. They do have a good assortment of undercover vehicles, beside the apparent majority of unmarked Vitaras - I know they have an E36 with matte paint, a Yamaha motor scooter and an AE101 wagon.
One of the main reasons they have switched over to the SUV's is interior space. With all the computers, radios, etc. the cars simply don't have enough interior space.
In fact, the last time I visited my brother on patrol, it appeared that even getting someone in the F passenger seat in the Explorer would be an adventure.
Here in Edmonton it’s mostly the explorers and the old p71 though they have some tahoes in the fleet aswell. Well that’s not including the fleet of drag vehicles edmonton police and Leduc RCMP have lol.
City- Impalas
County- Chargers
State- Various. Still a lot of Crown Vics. + SUVs and trucks.
Encon- Jeeps and assorted.
All I know is I appreciate the EcoBoost's running on 93 octane, really helps keep the price in check at the local station the PD uses.
I asked a cop buddy about this recently and he had said that nobody likes being in the taurus and the chargers are old and cramped. GM apparently stopped making the tahoe police packages so they are just used abused hand me downs now.
The real reason they like the explorer is that you can get them CNG or diesel so the monthly fuel cost is much better for operating costs on the department as well as the space. They have so many gadgets and guns and etc in conjunction with the laptop there just isn't much space for anything else.
plus have you ever been in the back of a cop car? I'm 6'4" and I can tell you that it is cramped back there! they must expect every criminal to be 5'1" or something... or children. Most expensive set of free tires I burned off a few years back...
The whole fleet key/immobilizer delete option is pretty neat for engine swap purposes. You could theoretically run any 3.5 Ecoboost engine fairly easily if you got your hands on one of those cars as a donor.
We have about 50/50 Explorers with 4wd and then later model FWD Impalas on studded snow tires.
I live at the top of a mountain with over 300 inches of snow annually and I always wonder if I called the police if they look at a map and then try to send something that could make it? Probably 20% of the population in my muni wouldn't be able to be reached by the Impalas even with studs so I actually wish all police vehicles up here were just the Explorers.
NGTD said:One of the main reasons they have switched over to the SUV's is interior space. With all the computers, radios, etc. the cars simply don't have enough interior space.
In fact, the last time I visited my brother on patrol, it appeared that even getting someone in the F passenger seat in the Explorer would be an adventure.
This is what SWMBO's sister and (soon to be ex) BIL have told me, everyone hates the Taurii because they have no space inside.
The Staties here run either Tauruses or Exploders, with a few odd CVs still in service, mostly as unmarked cars. A lot of the local departments still run the Crown Vics, but Exploders are becoming more prevalent and a few have Impalas. Strangely, I can't think of anywhere local that uses Chargers. I even know of a couple of the old B body Caprices still (presumably) in service. One is a fire chief's car, the other is always parked in the same spot out in front of an old Chevy dealer that the county now must use as a service center for its fleet vehicles.
Don't even get me started on unmarked cars for traffic stops. I understand that unmarked cars enable them to make more money, but getting the public used to pulling over for plain cars with lights, in my opinion, is the opposite of public safety.
fear not cop friends, the taurusssessessiii's will be out of production (including police) Come March next year.
fidelity101 said:The real reason they like the explorer is that you can get them CNG or diesel so the monthly fuel cost is much better for operating costs on the department as well as the space. They have so many gadgets and guns and etc in conjunction with the laptop there just isn't much space for anything else.
They put the transit diesel in explorers? wtf? All the local ones have the n/a 6.
snailmont5oh said:Don't even get me started on unmarked cars for traffic stops. I understand that unmarked cars enable them to make more money, but getting the public used to pulling over for plain cars with lights, in my opinion, is the opposite of public safety.
We have a few here that have the POLICE branding in matte black on a gloss black car. Is that supposed to look cool or what? It’s hard to see and seems counter productive. If it’s an undercover car make it so, if not- make it obvious.
Back in the day Ringold/Catoosa Co. Ga. police had TransAms. We would drive up on the weekend just to screw with them. Come home and work the week to pay the tickets.
There was not alot to do in Cedartown.
I always get a chuckle out of seeing the unmarked VA state troopers driving the last of the Impalas. They have so much weight in the trunk the ass of the cars are always noticably sagging.
PS: The Sheriffs headstone. Not sure the TA looks any better than a c71, P71, PPV etc.....RIP.
Gasoline said:Back in the day Ringold/Catoosa Co. Ga. police had TransAms. We would drive up on the weekend just to screw with them. Come home and work the week to pay the tickets.
There was not alot to do in Cedartown.
We got married in Catoosa Co. As of about 4 years ago, there was still nothing to do.
Cobb county had 4th Gen Z28's as police interceptors about 15 years ago. As a kid Hall County Sheriff had a seized drug dealers 300ZX TT as a D.A.R.E. car. The best part is beside all the sheriff's logos it had Jim Wolf and HKS stickers that they left. They would bring that to the "Beat the Heat" drag races at Commerce to drag race against the public to raise money. Good times.
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