Let’s face it: three row SUVs suck, in terms of actually carrying three rows of passengers, never mind getting them in and out. And minivans are only moderately better. But there’s a better way, as shown by this commodious Cadillac Fleetwood six-door nine passenger sedan I found in the parking lot at Costco. Well, if you had six kids, you’d be shopping at Costco for sure.
Of course, who has six kids anymore? From the looks of the interior of this one, kids are not part of the equation. This is the middle seat.
And here’s the back seat. presumably the buyer is in the store stocking up on Angel Soft tissues.
This one was made by Superior, which made so many hearses, limos and other specialized bodies for so long. Do they still make six-door sedans?
Yes they do. Although it’s rather less graceful than the older style I found. So how would kids feel if they were dropped off in this at school?
Given my barely controlled disgust and rude, salty sarcasm for expensive, pick up truck derived, “badge engineered” hulks commonly known as “Luxury SUV” people movers; I would take this alternative in a heartbeat.
What’s NOT to like here!
I realize that at age 63 I am growing crotchety & grumpy….but I can recall a time when pick up trucks (or their derived delivery vans) were considered second class transportation, tradesman transportation, farm vehicles and not allowed to be parked in the driveways of the new suburban housing subdivisions that I grew up in during the 1960’s and 1070’s.
A surprising number of HOAs still have those rules on the books; whether or not they choose to enforce them, and how selectively, is another matter.
And I wonder how they’d feel about an old funeral limo…
One could probably guess my opinion on enforcing these rules…..
My HOA still bans pickups. I’m surprised they still do.
You must not live in the South, I take it. Or Texas.
While I don’t own a truck, I can pretty accurately describe how I’d feel if I spent $50K on an optioned-out crew cab F-150 and an officious HOA sent me a letter saying I wasn’t allowed to park it in my own driveway. This is one of the reasons I don’t live in an HOA neighborhood.
Funny thing, when I visited a friend in Houston in ’83, driving through the nouveau-riche subdivisions along FM 1960 I noticed the standard complement of vehicles in driveways was a Euro sedan (MB/BMW – nowadays likely a Lexus), a large American station wagon (with obligatory Di-Noc), and a 4WD pickup. Little did I know that was a forecast of the future market (although with a CUV or large SUV replacing the wagon).
That’s a beautiful machine; I love the interiors (I feel compelled to use the plural of interior).
The green leather and immaculate carpets are very inviting, and the long wheel base promises a smooth ride. Such nice interiors with children are possible if snacks are limited to little bags of Cheerios (easy to vacuum) and drinks to water (not much staining). At least that’s how we did it back in the day.
Now, about parking… that excess outside its space invites dings from inattentive shoppers, and backing out will be a challenge to most, even with the good visibility. If it was mine I’d find a pull through or back-in spot way out in the hinterlands and make the trek to the store on foot.
And, you could rent it out (with driver of course) on prom night. Just tell the prom attendees they were limited to Cheerios and water.
My exact thoughts on parking!
Although, I’m seeing a charcoal gray leather, not green.
And I’m seeing blue!
And I am seeing ‘That 90’s Teal’. It’s probably some mix of all of these tones. I like it!
That is GM “mid-blue” that could be found in oodles of professional cars. Better leather than “mouse fur”
But all we’ve got are Doritos and Mountain Dew! You’re harshing our mellow, The Man! Fight the power! Anarchy! Anarchy!
If only there could be a way to fit GM’s Quadra-Steer system to one of these.
I can only imagine that since the system was developed for their full-size trucks, squeezing it underneath a car platform, even the Fleetwood’s body-on-frame, would be nigh impossible without it looking like it’s been lifted.
Apparently everything Quadrasteer-related was contained in the rear axle assembly. So if you can fit a regular Silverado rear axle under the Caddy, you could probably do the same with a Quadrasteer.
Or perhaps the CT6’s all wheel steering?
No the Quadrasteer rear axle was a couple of inches wider than the standard trucks and their bed sides had flares to keep the wheels covered. Due to that extra width they had to have the ICC lights. The problem is that the frames were the same so to allow any meaningful steering angle they had to increase the track width.
This is a compelling question. As one who knows a family who had their 11th child nearly two years ago (the tie-breaker, but rumor has it they have #12 on the way), this would be a good second vehicle to their 15 passenger GMC.
With the wheelbase on their GMC being around 145″ (give or take one or two), I doubt the wheelbase on this Cadillac is much different so parking lots would be similarly approached.
Can’t help but wonder if these are like limousines in which they really don’t command much in resale value after a few years.
There’s a family not five miles from us that bought a stretch Caddy vs. a passenger van for shuttling duty. It got a set of aftermarket wheels and tires shortly after, and I see it often heading back and forth to town. They said it gets better mileage than a full-size van, too.
Wheelbase is about the same, but how about overhangs? A GMC van has 89″ of combine front and rear overhang.
“… how would kids feel if they were dropped off in this at school?”
Bystander’s answer: “Wow, that must be a big family.“ A girl I knew in elementary school was dropped off in a Checker Aerobus. A car-aware kid doesn’t forget stuff like this.
The point here is weak. I do not believe the 90s three-row Caddilac is a good alternative choice to morden 3-row SUV and minivan. Today SuV and minivan are better in almost every aspect like power, handle, efficiency, comfort and safety. I occasionally drive a 2010 Chevrolet Suburban with 5.3-liter V 8 at work place. I am amazed how good it handles except it’s size. I drove a 1993 Chevrolet Caprice with 5.7-liter V 8 with police package few times, I prefer the new Suburban, which is much better than a 1986 Suburban diesel I also drove in 90s. In addition, the Caddilac limo in picture looks longer than the GM SUV parked next. The popularity of 3 -row Subs among the US families is car makers finally to make a vehicle they need. Also the vintage of Caddilac in term of style is totally lost out, it does not look like an American car at all. Driving it around town makes people thinking you operating a failing prom party company.
Opinions, like your gas mileage, may vary.
“…Today SUV and minivan are better in almost every aspect like power, handle, efficiency, comfort and safety…”
Thus missing the point entirely. The owner who loves and pampers one of these doesn’t care one whit about those factors, in this car. He has a silver-grey crossover with a mouse-fur grey cloth interior for when he wants to be boring and average.
When I think of limousines or similar vehicles being used as family transportation, I can’t help but thinking of my former college president.
When I was in college in the 1990s, our school’s president owned a 1930s-era Rolls-Royce limo. Apparently when he was a young professor in the 1960s, he took a teaching assignment in England for a few years, and when his term was done there, he wanted to take his family (w/ 3 or 4 kids) on a driving tour of Europe.
There weren’t many European cars of the era that were (comfortably) up to such a task, but one day he saw the Rolls-Royce for sale. Pre-war cars weren’t too valuable then, so he bought it cheaply and spent a few months driving around Europe on his vacation, and then had the Rolls shipped back to the US… where he still owned it 30 years later. (His daily driver was an Alfa 164, so he was a bit of a car enthusiast.)
He gave me a ride in it once — the only pre-war car I’ve ever ridden in — and I was extremely impressed at how comfortable it was. And as a family vacation-mobile, it was second-to-none!
That’s awesome, and perfect for a college president. Quirky, eccentric, yet stylish. Between that and the Alfa he sounds like a great guy. A professor at my school drove a BMW 5-series when those weren’t often seen in our parts, and that always seemed pretty cool as well. Still not as good as a Rolls, though.
He was a great guy. After he found out that I was a car nut, he not only took me for a ride in the Rolls-Royce, but he also let me drive his Alfa around town for a bit.
He also mentioned that when I got married, I should let him know and he’d drive me and my bride to our wedding in the Rolls-Royce (he did this occasionally for folks). Unfortunately, when I did get married it was 10 years later and 1,000 miles away — we ended up driving a rented Grand Am instead. Nice… but not quite the same.
The rising and dipping of the chrome piece at the top of the window on the new Cadillac limo looks awkward. Could they have perhaps designed that a bit better?
The wheels are so far apart and the overhangs so small it looks rather like a Landcrab limo. Oh dear…
WHY can’t FoMoCo and GM work as diligently at developing a spacious, comfortable rear wheel AUTOMOBILE instead of the pick up truck derived monsters?
If Detroit can make a tall, tipsy, crude, rude, rough riding, noisy pick truck into a “luxury” vehicle; just image what they could do updating the real thing!
Profit margins are through the roof on trucks and SUV’S and demand is high. Full sized cars not so much.
Have you ridden in any pickup produced in the last ten years? Your descriptors make it sound like you haven’t had the opportunity to do so.
Jason: Yes, I have. They do ride MUCH better than pick up trucks of the 1970’s.
BUT
It is STILL a high off the ground, difficult to climb into/out of, high roll center, tippy handling and slow stopping, clumsy pick up truck; NOT an automobile.
Paul just wrote a rather long lecture for me on that very subject a week or so ago, but I’m sure he’ll repeat it for you.
Where was this at? It sounds intriguing.
They certainly CAN but SHOULD they?
Chrysler has the 300 and Dodge has the Charger, both are fairly spacious and generally reliable with proven powertrains. And are sold at very reasonable prices, both new as well as used. However, neither is setting any sales charts on fire.
However, there isn’t really much that they offer that is better than the Chevrolet Impala or the Buick LaCrosse if one insists on a domestic label, both of which are also in jeopardy of being cancelled.
If you want to spend more money and it has to be RWD, Tesla will happily sell you a RWD Model S that includes 7 seats if desired.
Buyers don’t seem to be clamoring for any of them (besides the Tesla I suppose) and I don’t think it’s due to any overarching quality issues. The market is clearly speaking in regard to RWD sedans from Ford, GM, and FCA and frankly, these being public companies, their responsibility is to try to earn money for their shareholders. Currently they are more likely to do so with Trucks and SUV’s.
I refer you to the website: goodcarbadcar.net for a look at the sales performance of all classes of vehicle. While there are many very good full-sized sedans available, their popularity continues to slip, except at the top end of the market. The CUV is making a conquest of what was the traditional sedan segment.
Used stretch limousines go very cheaply as used cars. Generally they’re very well USED up by the time the company decides to write them off the books. Few used car buyers have any interest in or need for such a vehicle so they’re hard to sell.
I have been giving serious consideration to buying one of these for several years now. It started out with me just wanting one because I love big sedans and have wanted a Fleetwood for a long time. But now I almost can justify buying one. I have 2 sons that are 9 and 7 but my wife and I are in the process of becoming foster parents right now. I have an extended cab work truck and she has a 2 row Toyota 4Runner. So it will be very tight in the back seat if we have just one more kid back there, especially if they are in a baby seat. But so many times foster kids don’t come alone, they have brothers and/or sisters of their own. As it is right now, we would have to take two cars if we have 2 more kids with us. And the beauty of these 6 door Fleetwoods is that they are very easy to get in and out of, they have lived pampered lives and usually have low miles, and they are actually cheaper than a standard Fleetwood. The biggest obstacle I see is persuading the wife to be seen in one!
The black one looks totally like a funeral coach, the white one is much nicer looking. I think a lot of kids would think it cool to be dropped off to school in one of these things (the older style at least). Well, that’s what my 53 yr old self thinks.
Re: 6 kids – my partner works with a guy who has 6. He had two with his wife, and they each had 2 with previous partners that they now have custody of. So a Brady Bunch Family of 8 for sure!
I think this is better:
http://www.realclearlife.com/cars/custom-stretched-cadillac-escalade-evs-offers-private-jet-like-interior/#1
Okay, that looks pretty sweet. I’ll take mine with the optional bomb-blast protection, please.
It looks like hell, but that interior IS luxurious.
As a counterpoint… we owned six Suburbans and three Expeditions over the period of time our kids were growing up. They’ve gotten so nice, they’ll outdrive most luxury cars you’d care to name. Unfortunately they’re also priced accordingly. A new loaded Escalade can easily hit a six-figure price tag. Not that they were cheap back in the day. Our first Suburban was pricier than the Corvette I really wanted, but three kids and two Labradors put a damper on that.
Agreed; the big SUVs have certainly matched sedans in luxury, but man are they pricey. I casually checked out an Escalade as a possible replacement for our van and was dumbfounded at the base price, let alone a top-line version.
Top of the line minivans are really the biggest bargain out there in autodom nowadays. I’ll take a loaded Chrysler Pacifica myself, but if you must have AWD they’res always the Toyota Sienna Limited. Both of these (and the top-line Honda Odyssey too) are as luxurious as most luxury SUVs and crossovers, and the combination of high roof and low floor makes them the easiest thing to get into and out of.
Paul, nice find! It is a great alternative although not for everyone. After owning a 2000 Jeep Cherokee for 6 years or so I came to realize that I would rather drive a car than an SUV with an elevated center of gravity. As an aside I think this would be so much cooler than a van or minivan. This would be perfect for a large family or a travel team vehicle. I could see our local ski jump team using it to pull a trailer and putting a rocket box or two on top to haul skiers all over USSA Central Division.
As a side note: these shots demonstrates the 93-96 Fleetwood at some of its best angles…here it appears like a sleek, and not overly bulbous, update on the 80-92.
The vinyl roof doesn’t work at all on these though.
Oh, there’s a lot that doesn’t work on these. The best I can say for them is that they rode nicely and got great gas mileage for their size. The one (4 door sedan, not limousine) I owned from 2014-15 (silver with burgundy interior) had the vinyl roof, and even if you like vinyl roofs it was terrible with the aerodynamic look underneath. And other angles–especially in profile, make it look like an upside down bathtub. Those curves and puffs didn’t help visibility much either–the corners are very difficult to gauge from the driver’s seat because the hood curves down and away, not like the prior generations going back to even the early 70s with the lamp monitors at each corner of the hood. The very high decklid in back almost completely obscures vision over the trunk to the rear for backup parking maneuvers: these cars didn’t come with backup cameras but could have used them, the field of vision was worse than on the 80s model with the limousine-look rear window. I’ve gotten into the craptastic plastic interior and switchgear in previous posts on these, so I won’t do that again.
As a person with a preacher pop, these just remind me of funerals…I can’t really shake that as almost every funeral in the ny/no area ran with the Caddy Commercial 6-door stretch for families of the bereaved.
The tissue boxes in rows 2 and 3 make me think that this one may still be so employed.
I saw a local family using a Lincoln Town Car limousine for exact the purpose of family vehicle.
And for certain specifications, a Cadillac XTS limousine is only as long as a regular Cadillac Fleetwood, and I happened to drive side by side one time and it looked funny.
Since I was a kid, my benchmarks for commodious rear seat accommodations have been Dad’s 1947 Cadillac Fleetwood, with so much legroom in back that there were rotate-out footrests (I loved them) and his 1941 Chevy Master Deluxe Town Coupe, with perhaps an even-more-commodious back seat. Having seen in the last few years a 1942 Fleetwood, with the same body as the ’47, I’m not imagining the amazing legroom. And, because I actually drove that same ’41 Chevy, I know it had lots of room!
We actually have a family with 6 kids at our elementary school. Last year they replaced their Yukon XL with an AWD Mercedes Sprinter Passenger Van with a high roof but the standard wheelbase. She now typically drives around with all 6 kids and takes several other kids home as well after school (because she can). I daresay it’s much more maneuverable than this 6-door Cadillac would be.
As one of the few here who has actually driven a 6 door stretch limo, I will confirm that maneuverability is not among its (very few) charms.
I worked at a job in the late 70s where I got to /had to drive a pair of 6 door Lincolns, a 78 and a 79. My father had a 78 Town Coupe at the time so I had an actal point of comparison. The ride was only so-so because the suspension was so stiff. The combination of the super long wheelbase and all the front and rear overhang made the thing feel like a see saw when you hit a dip or rise in the road.
Parking was a real chore because all that length made tight turns impossible.
I simply hated the things. Just looking at this one gives me bad flashbacks.
I’ve always wanted a 1967 Cadillac 75 series limo. But it would just be silly for me to drive around in it by myself. That Escalade was very cool, but again the driver never gets to enjoy any of that backseat luxury.
As you can see, a true Cadillac production limo only has four doors and the rear quarters are like a CDV. When the rear doors are opened the passenger is not fully exposed to the masses.
The six door has much better space for the middle seat passengers. The 75 is really all about the rear seat passengers. Here’s a shot of the interior. Fold down the jump seats and it would be perfect for the Fleetwood Lawyer
I’ve thought more than once that a six-door would be great for a large family. Plus, it improves the proportions of the Caddy–the extra wheelbase makes the extremely long overhangs look somewhat less unwieldy.
While this one is too old, could you use a newer one as an UberXL? Probably some sort of grinchy rule against it, but I’d be pleased to see one of these pull up. I did once have a ride in an actual marked (non-rideshare) taxi based on a stretch Lincoln Town Car–that was somewhat interesting, though it was late at night so no one saw my stylish (?) arrival.
The new one looks awful; your children would have to wear bags over their heads if they were to show up at school in that. The older car has a more classy look – it’d be great for the school prom or graduation, as a daily driver it’s OTT. Gas mileage must be horrendous if it’s a daily driver, but its mileage was probably low when it was purchased since limos often don’t work as hard as taxis do.