On May 16, 2009, I bought a 2010 Toyota Prius in Blizzard Pearl. I wasn't even on the waiting list. It was the first Third Generation Prius to hit my local dealership, and I drove it off the lot before even the salespeople got a look through the window.  It was so new that owners of the previous Prius model would park next to it and walk away without so much as a glance. 

A '10 Prius. I've never hugged a tree. I don't own Birkenstocks. 

Warning: this is a long, long review. It's as much about the process of deciding to buy a hybrid as it is about the car itself.

The lease on my '06 Mercedes ML 350 ended in June.  My ML was safe, comfortable, and never had a single mechanical problem, but I knew from previous experience with an E320 wagon that I didn't want to own a Mercedes outside the warranty period.  Last summer, I started to seriously consider my ML's replacement. 

I knew I wanted a smaller vehicle and better fuel economy. I may not be a staunch environmentalist, but I hate waste more. I compost, I reuse plastic containers, and I hate excessive packaging. I keep a dozen canvas grocery bags in my car. Gas prices aside, why get 16, 18, or even 20 MPG if you can get 30? I decided that a BMW or Audi wagon was in my future. No more SUVs. A 535 xi is capable of 24 MPG highway; a 328i wagon is capable of 27. An Audi A3 wagon might get me to 30. A Volkswagen Jetta TDI wagon clocks in at a whopping 41 MPG highway. The more I thought about it, and the more I weighed in fuel economy over luxury, the more interested I became in the Jetta. I didn't seriously consider a hybrid until one afternoon in my SUV at my kids' school. A carpool queue moves at a snail's pace, but it moves. You can't turn off your car. On a particularly bad day, I idled and rolled for fifteen minutes. That was my lightbulb moment. Highway mileage is all fine and good, but like most suburban moms, I don't drive on the highway. I spend the vast majority of my time behind the wheel at stoplights, stop signs, and in slow-moving traffic. I would never see 41 MPG from a diesel.

The suburban parent needs a car that performs at its best in the carpool queue at school. A car that turns off its engine and rolls along on battery power as he or she inches forward in hopes of eventually loading the kids into the backseat. A car of such perfect parsimony and harmony with the suburban parent's lifestyle that I heard harps in my mind when it occurred to me: the Toyota Prius was the mommymobile for me.

2010 Toyota Prius, at a glance

The full specs are available online at http://www.toyota.com/prius-hybrid/specs.html but here are some of the basics for those who care.

1.8L 4-Cyl. Hybrid
98 hp @ 5200 rpm
Curb weight: 3042 lbs
Passenger volume (cu. ft.): 93.7
Fuel tank capacity: 11.9 gallons
Fuel economy: 51 city, 48 highway, 50 combined

Let's Build a '10 Prius

The Prius packages have changed since the previous generation, and are now divided into grades I-V. Package I is not available yet as far as I can tell, and package II starts at $22,750.  You can compare the packages side by side at http://www.toyota.com/prius-hybrid/features.html

When I 'built my Prius' at the Toyota site, I went for package V with all the bells and whistles. It worked out to about $32,000-- a lot for a midsize Toyota, but still far less than a new BMW.  I didn't care so much about the dynamic radar cruise control or lane keep assist, but leather and navigation were absolute musts. I was a little down on moonroofs because every one I've ever had has rattled, but I loved the idea of Toyota's solar roof. I had my heart set on blizzard pearl, a sparkly alternative to flat white, but everyone told me to keep an open mind with regard to colors. "If you want it soon, take the color they have". Bah.

I kept an open mind, sort of, and allowed myself to consider silver or dark gray. I contacted four local dealers on 5/15, because I knew that '09 Prii were festering on the lots with their non-hybrid counterparts.  "Want to sell me a '10 Prius, I asked?" The first three dealers reacted like the prom queen when a guy in the chess club asks her for a date: with disdainful disinterest bordering on disbelief. I think one of them even laughed at me under his breath. Then I stumbled on to Dennis Bacote at Beaverton Toyota who not only took my name and phone number, but asked what options I wanted and promised to call me as soon as he heard when the '10 Prius might hit Portland.

And then he called me the next morning.

"I have a '10 Prius in blizzard pearl," he told me. "It's a package III and not a V like you wanted, but you can come in to be the first to test drive one if you'd like. I also have a package IV in black".

I made my way to the dealership, and there they were: black and white, side by side. I've always had black cars, but I loved blizzard pearl the first time I saw it online, and I loved it even more in person. To quote my Twillight-loving tween, "it sparkles in the sunshine like Edward".  

The Test Drive

I drove the previous generation Prius a couple of times, but I never loved it. It's not that the car didn't have its endearing qualities (including a turning radius the likes of which I've only seen on a carousel) but I just wasn't mentally ready to give up German luxury for what is, essentially, the automotive equivalent of an iPod: compact and loaded with gadgety goodness, but nobody's idea of the ultimate sound system. Or driving machine. I digress.

When I got into the '10 Prius, I was ready to make that change. I didn't expect teutonic titillation; I expected something that would get me to the same endpoint with a third the waste, but keep me engaged with all sorts of buttons and read-outs. 

My first observation was that the Prius brakes hard. It took a few minutes to get used to it, but by the third or fourth stop sign Dennis relaxed and looked confident that I wouldn't send him through the windshield. He explained to me that it's okay to step a little harder on the brakes in a Prius, since regenerative braking is what charges the hybrid battery. Braking and coasting, especially coasting downhill, keep the hybrid battery charged. 

My second observation was that the '10 Prius was sluggish. We had it in eco mode, which provides maximum fuel efficiency by limiting performance. I tried power mode, and I was blown away by how responsive the Prius was to the gas pedal. In the months since, I've used power mode many times to merge on to freeways or to take off at full speed from a stoplight and blow past all those pretty performance cars. Hey, it's a Prius. You have to keep people on their toes.

The Prius also comes with EV or electric-only mode. I've never used it. It keeps the gas engine from coming on, but it's useful only at low speeds and over very short distances. I do the bulk of my driving in normal mode with none of those three modes selected. 
If you've never driven a hybrid, it can be a little disconcerting the first time the gasoline engine shuts off at a stoplight. You'll think the car died. It didn't. At stops, the Prius switches itself over to battery power. The engine turns on again when the Prius gets thirsty. 

Rear visibility sucks. There's no better way to say it. It's the trade-off you make to achieve a shape that's this fuel efficient. The standard back-up camera helps when you're in reverse, but doesn't do anything for you on the road. I've learned to rely more heavily on my side mirrors, and to turn my head every time I change lanes. 

As a total gadget hound, I loved the car's many read-outs. The steering wheel controls are extensive, and control the onboard computers,the audio system,  and to some extent, the climate system.

We drove through backroads, on to the freeway, and into heavy street traffic.  Despite improvements over the previous generations, the '10 Prius still doesn't handle like a dream. It's easily blown around by wind, and although I can't explain why, it feels to me like it has a higher center of gravity than it should. It doesn't hug the road around turns, but rather, feels like a tippy, tall SUV.  At high speeds, say over sixty five, the rearview mirror vibrates. It's not audible, but it's dizzying to stare at for too long. There's your silver-lining, glass-is-half-full tie-in to poor rear visibility: who cares if the rearview mirror makes you dizzy, since it's not useful anyway?

Those are the negatives. Under normal driving conditions on a freeway-- without high winds or sharp turns-- the '10 Prius is fairly comfortable. I'm not sure I'd want to drive it across country, but I had to remind myself several times that I've never driven any car across country.  "Buy a car for the conditions in which you'll actually drive it," I told myself. 

In city conditions, the '10 Prius handles quite well. It's stable, comfortable, and if you choose to look in the rearview mirror for a bifurcated, incomplete view of the world behind you, it will not make you dizzy.

We put about ten miles on the virgin Prius, and then drove it back to the lot to check out the trunk and backseat. I was surprised and impressed by how much space I found in both. I sat in the backseat for a few minutes to take it all in, and a thought occurred to me: this package III Prius was blizzard pearl and it had navigation. All that was missing from my holy trifecta was leather seats. Could I live with fabric? Dennis never asked. He never tried to sell me the car. In the background, I heard him talking-- he'd call me as soon as a package V came in, he could search other dealerships in the west for the features I wanted, yada yada yada. It was a low din beneath my own thoughts: who needs leather? Do I need leather? This car is the color I wanted, and it has the navigation system. When was the last time you walked into a dealership and spent $7000 less than you planned to spend on a car?

"I'll take it".

I bought the car on the spot-- not because I was afraid I'd never find one with more features, but because I decided I just didn't care that much about leather. It was a very freeing moment, and it was kind of a stroke of dumb luck. By the time we started the paperwork, four other customers tried to buy the car. When I returned later that day to pick-up my ML 350, which I'd left in their visitors lot, the black '10 Prius was gone too. It was three more weeks before any other dealer called to tell me they "might have a '10 Prius coming in".

Ownership

Owning a car is so different than test-driving a car. So many car reviews are based on test drives. The drivers may be professionals, but the features they notice aren't always the ones that matter to drivers. I'm NOT a professional. I'm going to assume you've read the professional reviews, and try to elaborate on the day to day driving experience instead.

Storage

As I noticed on the test drive, the Prius has a nice big trunk. That was one thing I loved about my SUV-- it could handle as many rolls of paper towels as Costco saw fit to bundle together. So can my Prius. There's a cargo cover for smaller loads or privacy, and it has the added advantage of reducing glare on the rear window. 

The Prius has a dual-compartment glove box. There's plenty of space, but there's a niggling design flaw: the interiors are hard plastic, so objects inside the glove boxes tend to rattle. One of these days I'll remember to line them with a couple of hand towels to absorb vibrations.

The center console sliding armrest is great. The top slides back or lifts up depending on how much access you need. There's a second cupholder, a storage compartment, and a nifty little iPod garage with both a power outlet and auxiliary input jack. 

The storage compartments on the back of the front seats are almost useless. Basically, they're nets on hard plastic. My kids hate that they can't hide their iPods in them when we go into a store. 

The storage pockets on the front doors are mostly useless too. They'll hold a water bottle, maybe, but not much else. 

I mentioned the cupholder in the center console armrest-- there's another in front of it on the dashboard, and two more in the backseat armrest. The front cupholder is strangely deep, and was clearly designed for the venti/big gulp crowd. My 12 oz cappuccino is in up to its lid.  The cupholders are very basic, and don't really hug your drink. If cupholders are important to you, take a travel mug or Starbucks up on your test drove.

There are under-floor storage areas in the trunk, which are perfect for emergency supplies. Once again, I'd suggest a blanket or towel beneath them so that things don't shift and rattle against the hard surface.

As in most cars, the rear-seats fold down flat for more cargo space.

Keys? What are those?

Every Prius has two nifty feature that make keys a thing of the past. Smart Key and Remote keyless entry allow you to keep your "key", which is actually a small remote control, in your pocket or purse. To start your Prius, just step on the brake and push the power button. 

To unlock the driver's door, I grip the driver's side door handle. To lock it, once all doors are close, I tap the grooves on the driver's side door handle with one finger.  Your Prius will NOT let you lock the door if you accidentally leave the key inside the car. Locking and unlocking functions can be customized, and there are directions on how to do that in your Prius manual. These truly are "smart" features.


Navigation/Bluetooth/Audio

My Prius has the upgraded stereo that comes with the voice-activated touch-screen DVD navigation system. Even as a gadget-loving early adopter, I didn't find the Toyota navigation system as intuitive as the one on my previous car. Give yourself some time to get acquainted with it, and keep one thing in mind: most features are disabled when your car's in motion. This is irritating beyond belief. It's meant to be a safety feature so people don't screw with the touchscreen while they should be watching the road, but it goes too far. You can't even select an address that's already in your address book while you're driving. In the past, I handled the navigation system on road trips while my husband drove. No longer. Now, we can't make changes at all without stopping. I cannot express how much I hate this heavy-handed feature. 

Bluetooth was fairly intuitive. My Prius and my iPhone mated quickly and effortlessly, and within seconds my entire address book was available through the car's touch screen. Once I had the phone set-up, I discovered that the Prius' voice recognition is the best I've encountered so far. When I press the voice command button on my steering wheel and ask the car to call Steve, it calls Steve.  Unfortunately, the handsfree-calling system is as overbearing as the navigation system. My car dutifully calls mom at work when I ask it to call mom at work, but it will not allow me to "press 1" to transfer the call from a computer to a person. When you're in motion, it will not allow you to press a single button. As a tangential aside, the car caws at an increasingly frantic pace if you dare to remove your seatbelt. 

Sound System

Disclaimer: I'm not much of an audiophile. I love to listen to music or NPR in the car, but I'd never pay extra for an upgraded sound system. I have some sort of upgraded JBL stereo on this car, but only because it was part of the navigation package. It can hold 4 CDs, but I don't use CDs anyway: I use an iPod.

I bought an iPod nano to function as my car's musical brain. It lives in the center console full-time, always charged and always ready to play any of the 2000 songs in its memory. I switch the sound system to auxiliary, and then control the music through the iPod. Unfortunately, this isn't "true" iPod integration-- you can't control your iPod through the steering wheel controls the way you can control CDs. If you want to use your iPod in this type of set-up, it's easy-- just create playlists ahead of time. Once I'm in the playlist I want, I can move back or forth to another song with one finger on the iPod, and never take my eyes off the road.

This stereo has 8 speakers. I honestly can't tell you if they're good speakers, but I can tell you this: they're a lot for a small Prius to handle. If I turn up the volume past ~28 or so (out of 40) my bones vibrate and the already-vibrating rearview mirror jumps around like a small child with a full bladder. 


Climate Controls

My Prius III has single zone digital climate controls that allow you to set a precise temperature as low as 64°. The vents are not as maneuverable as I'd like, but the system is pretty efficient at cooling down the car's interior. I have not had any reason to use the heater yet. The front windshield wiper covers a respectable amount of the windshield, and can be fine-tuned from slow/intermittent to very fast. The rear wiper clears a tiny path along the rear window, but remember: the rear window is mostly useless and will make you dizzy anyway. I don't anticipate using the rear wiper all that much, even here in the drizzly Northwest.

Comfort

The seats are comfortable. What more is there to day? They seem reasonably supportive, but my package doesn't include lumbar support or power seats. We took a 350-mile round trip drive to the beach in this car, and the seats felt fine. No complaints.

I'm 5'6, my husband is 5'11. Neither of us has any complaints about legroom. Based on how far back I can push the seat, I suspect it would be comfortable for all but the tallest among us. 

Speaking of the seats, I'm still happy with the fabric. It's always a nice temperature, and my kids actually prefer it to leather. If I have one gripe, it's that the fabric used for trim is incredibly poor in quality. The fabric on the center console looks like a slightly-pilled sock after three months. What will it look like in three years?

Slight rant: Toyota has some of the best-selling cars in America, and they know they can sell a Prius whether they use good materials or not. I noticed the cheap sock-like fabric on the center console immediately, rolled my eyes, and accepted it. Long-term, it's a big mistake for Toyota to rest on its laurels like this. I don't consider the Insight a great alternative to the Prius yet, but it's only a matter of time until someone introduces a car with comparable fuel economy at the same price, and with more attention to detail. Toyota, if you're listening, spend a few bucks more on better upholstery. Really. While we're talking about the interior, I should mention one more thing. My fabric is "bisque", which is light beige. The headliner and ceiling in the car are gray. The colors are both so neutral that it took me months to notice, but it may bother some people that they don't match. 

The Displays

The dashboard on the '10 Prius is a significant departure from the previous generation's design. Cars like mine that have a navigation system have two big digital displays: one for the navigation system, phone, and stereo, and another above it for the Multi-Information Display.  The MID is an energy monitor and trip computer in one. It has several options to see your data-- a graphic of the car that shows where it's currently getting/using energy, a graph that shows fuel consumption history at specific intervals, and my favorite, a bar that shows, graphically, whether you're driving in a fuel efficient way. It also shows your average fuel economy over the length of the trip, your average speed, and how far you've gone. I reset this every time I fill my gas tank.  There's an instantaneous fuel consumption monitor on the dashboard, but the MID has really changed the way I drive. I'm not above flooring it in power mode to merge on to the freeway, but in general, the MID keeps me honest. I drive more responsibly than I ever have in my life, and that includes driving at (okay, slightly above) the speed limit.

Toyota made a big deal of the Touch Tracer Display in their promotional material, but it's kind of silly. To make a long story short, when you use the controls on your steering wheel, corresponding pictures glow on the dashboard. It looks cool, but that's about it. 
Blizzard Pearl and Dirt
I've never owned a white car before, but after years of black Mercedes that always looked filthy in Portland's drizzly climate, I didn't have high expectation. To my delight, Blizzard Pearl seems more forgiving than either black or plain white. 

Fuel Economy

The EPA estimates of 48 highway, 51 city are reasonable, but my real world experience has been flipped around a bit. I tend to get better mileage on the highway-- as high as 54 mpg averaged over long distances without making any special effort. In the city, it's more like 48. Here's why. I run a lot of brief errands. It takes the Prius a few minutes to warm up and hit its stride. If I have a full afternoon of city driving, the car blows me away with 55 mpg performance. I sat in bumper-to-bumper traffic last Friday on the freeway. The trip to the airport, which should have taken 30 minutes, took close to two hours. I stopped and rolled, stopped and rolled... to the tune of 56 miles per gallon. Similarly, during trips around town that take more than a few minutes, I have no trouble getting 50. 

The things that bring my average down to 49 combined are that: 
1. I make a lot of fast round-trips to the grocery store, where the car never has a chance to warm up and I average in the low 40s. 
2. I live on a mountain, and have to climb back up the hill to get home. The trip down doesn't really balance out the trip up-- I always get better fuel economy outside of my immediate neighborhood. If you live in a relatively flat area, it's hard for me to imagine you could average under 50 with this car.

Another note regarding fuel economy: I've read that a Prius doesn't get its best fuel economy until it has 10,000 to 15,000 miles under its belt. Mine has under 3000 miles as of today, 8/31/09. If I continue to get 49 combined in my day-to-day driving up and down a mountain, I won't complain. If I can expect even better fuel economy down the road, I'll take it. Either way, I am positively thrilled with this car's fuel efficiency.  
The fuel capacity may be 11.9 gallons, but when the fuel gauge gets down to rock bottom and begins to flash in warning, it only takes about 9.5 gallons to fill it up. 
I go about 460 miles between fill-ups. Even with gas prices on the rise, I spend well under $30 to fill the tank. 
According to the user's manual, the Prius requires 88 octane fuel. This is a departure from previous generations, which used 87.  I've used "plus" fuel (89 octane here) to be on the safe side, but Toyota's revised materials explain that this was an error and that 87 octane fuel is sufficient. It's a small thing, but if you bought a Prius to save on fuel, the last thing you want to buy is higher octane gas. 'Regular' is just fine.

In Summary

The '10 Prius has its negatives. It gets blown around in the wind, the rear visibility is a joke, and some of the materials used in the car's interior are unacceptably cheap. For city driving, which is mostly what I do, I'm thrilled with this car. It's comfortable, has an abundance of lights and buttons, and I love its quirky shape and sparkly paint. Then there's the fuel economy, which is roughly triple what my previous car got under typical driving conditions.

Five stars... for now.

Note: I will update this review at regular intervals as I notice more things about my Prius, either bad or good. If I left something out, please feel free to mention it in the comments section and I'll do my best to answer.
Amount Paid (US$): 25500
Condition: New
Model and Options: III