Though the Henry Ford Museum is among the largest of its sort on this planet, it is nonetheless not massive sufficient to publicly show all its autos. Situated in Dearborn, Michigan, the constructing contains a storage facility the place entry is restricted. Nevertheless, Prime Gear was invited to see Ford’s secret stash of vehicles, together with the Alpe.
What was it? The quirky idea began as a Ford Escort earlier than Ghia turned it right into a boxy small crossover that may’ve preceded the Pontiac Aztek by a number of years. It initially debuted in 1996 on the defunct Turin Auto Present and was subsequently exhibited with a barely totally different design on the 1998 Detroit Auto Present. A few years later, BMW bought Land Rover to Ford, giving it entry to a small off-roader within the type of the Freelander.
Alpe was engineered with a naturally aspirated 2.0-liter gasoline engine and four-wheel drive. It had a jacked-up suspension with beneficiant floor clearance and 17-inch wheels. Ford gave it a maroon-colored dashboard, a translucent plexiglass roof, and seat upholstery partially made with recycled soda bottles.
The late Ross Roberts, who was Ford Division Basic Supervisor on the time, stated the intent behind Alpe was to gauge shopper response to a small crossover priced at round $20,000. Ford needed to go battle the CR-V and RAV4, however it wasn’t till 2001 when the first-gen Escape was launched. The smaller EcoSport got here out a few years later, though the US market did not get it till 2018.
In hindsight, Alpe was most likely a missed alternative given the rise of SUVs within the a long time that adopted. It additionally regarded much less dorky than the Aztek. Then once more, the Escort was approaching the top of its life cycle because the Focus took its place within the lineup within the early 2000s. The unique Escape co-developed with Mazda gave Ford the smaller crossover it wanted, so Alpe in the end by no means occurred.
