High fuel prices have surely altered most consumer's driving habits. The gas crunch has gotten bad enough that even police units have found it necessary to change their routines. For instance, in Palm Bay, Florida, Police Chief William Berger has banned officers from allowing their patrol cars to idle. The only circumstances where idling a police vehicle is permissible is when an animal or prisoner is left inside the vehicle. Turning off the vehicle sometimes requires on-board computers to be rebooted and, of course, raises the internal temperature of the vehicle since the air conditioner is no longer running. Other agencies have been forced to park their motorcycle units, which could potentially lead to a lower level of service from the police force. According to spokesman Lt. Andrew Walters of the Brevard County Sheriff's Office, "Our motorcycle unit... will stay intact. It's an integral part of our service, as the No. 1 complaint to the sheriff's office is traffic-related."

One easy way to reduce fuel consumption is to choose a more efficient vehicle, and that's exactly what some agencies have done. "Our fuel usage is actually less than what it was last year because we changed from Crown Victorias to Chevy Impalas. The Impalas get much better mileage," Cocoa's Acting Police Chief Mark Klayman says. The Impala is a front-wheel-drive unibody design which uses a V6 engine while the Crown Vic is a traditional rear-wheel-drive, body on frame vehicle powered by a V8. Seems like switching to the Impala would be an easy choice as opposed to laying off officers or reducing motorcycle units.

[Source: Florida Today via CarScoop]

When newly-appointed Chicago Police Supt. Jody Weis was given an open floor at a Chicago Crime Commission luncheon held in his honor, he suggested that he would like to see Chicago's aging fleet of Ford Crown Victoria police cars replaced with Chevrolet Tahoe's. He noted that the four-wheel-drive capabilities could prove helpful in Chicago's historically snowy winters and the extra storage space would also be welcome. While the emissions of these Tahoe's would likely be an improvement over the older Crown Vic, the fuel mileage is a wash at 11 miles per gallon. Yes, that's right -- their fuel mileage is not even in the teens.

Here's a perfect example of how Europe is thinking differently than the U.S. when it comes to what is really necessary for police work. Perhaps Chevy could at lease release a Police edition of their hybrid Tahoe?

[Source: The Chicago Tribune]

The Toronto Police Services is trying to lessen its environmental impact by adjusting the way it goes about some of its daily activities. To that end, the cops have added a pair of Honda Civic Hybrids and a pair of smart fortwo diesels to the fleet. The idea behind the change is to utilize vehicles that are easier to operate and park in the the denser urban environment. The smarts are being used for parking enforcement, where the aggravation one feels at seeing Five-0 writing you a parking ticket is presumably mitigated by the sight of the cute little two-seater wearing a police car costume. ("Oh, isn't that just darling?")

Of course, when you're paying said ticket, you won't remember the car as being so cute anymore.

[Source: Torontoist]

Click on the photo for high-res images of the Ford E85 cop car

On Monday at the Alternative Fuels and Vehicles National Conference in Anaheim, California, Ford will take the wraps off the updated 2008 Crown Victoria Police Interceptor. The biggest change for the 2008 models will be the addition of flex-fuel capability to the 4.6L V-8 allowing them to run on any blend of gasoline and ethanol up to E85. The new cop cars are fifty-state certified, as are all 2008 Ford flex-fuel passenger cars. Ford has sold more than two million flex-fuel vehicles to date, at least a dozen of which have ever had any ethanol pumped into their tanks. Visually, the only distinction for the 2008 Crown Vics and other E85 capable models will be a new yellow gas cap. The Ford press release is after the jump.



[Source: Ford]