I took the 2017 Ford Escape for a test-drive yesterday and it is awesome!
Ford has revamped the interior, making it feel more spacious, but of course what really excited me are the self-driving features.
The 2017 Escape comes with self-parking for both left- and right-hand parallel park, and left- and right-hand perpendicular park. The driver still has to work the brakes, but the car will steer itself into the spot, including executing a three-point turn, if necessary.
The 2017 Escape also comes with true adaptive cruise control for the highway — it will slow down and speed up with traffic, at least at highway speeds.
I also noticed a little bit of steering assist for staying in the lane, and sure enough the owner’s manual describes the lane-keeping system as working above 40mph.
Of course, I’m most excited for 2020, when Ford has announced launching a Level 4 autonomous vehicle. In the meantime, I’m excited for the ADAS features on the 2017 Escape Titanium to make their way to other models. Eventually, I’d love to see these features available outside of the Titanium trim level and all the way down to base models.
This is a terrific car, and I’m not just saying that because I work for Ford. 🙂
David Silver 