I’ve been operating the Citroën for the previous few months as a long-termer for Transfer Electrical, Autocar’s new sister model (go and take a look, it’s actually excellent). And till that time, I had felt that for all its sensible boxy practicality, the ë-Berlingo was essentially flawed, resulting from a real-world vary of perhaps 130 miles in the event you go wherever close to a motorway, dropping perilously near 100 miles in chilly climate.
For anybody who has skilled the sheer sensible pleasure of the ‘common’ Berlingo (now axed, a sufferer of EU fleet emissions targets), that vary was limiting. Each journey of 100- plus miles required a good quantity of planning, with a number of fallbacks to account for the vagaries of the UK’s charging community. That’s true of any EV, in fact, however most trendy ones provide you with much more leeway.
However a distinct comparability offers a distinct context. Sure, the vary is undoubtedly limiting and, provided that I hardly ever lug a lot stuff round, I might fortunately give up a bit of the ë-Berlingo’s virtually unfathomably giant inside in return for an even bigger battery. However flip it one other manner: the ë-Berlingo presents house, dimension and practicality unmatched by virtually some other electrical automotive of its footprint (except for its badge-engineered Fiat, Peugeot, Toyota and Vauxhall siblings, in fact). Positive, the Tesla Mannequin X is big, seats seven (like an ë-Berlingo XL) and has these cool gullwing doorways. However I’ll take the ë-Berlingo’s easier and extra usable side-sliding rear passenger doorways and its extremely easy-to-fill sq. load space.
