The highly specific American minivan

The old Chrysler Corporation knew they had something special when they debuted the modern minivan in November 1983. The "success car of the '80s," Lee Iacocca called it. For 2008, they'll be the last American minivan standing. GM and Ford have exited the segment.

There had been small vans before, of course. The Volkswagen Type 2, aka "VW Bus," was/is probably the most recognizable. The critical difference between a "small van" and a "minivan" is in the direction of the scaling. Essentially, a small van is a smaller copy of a big van, complete with engine doghouse, bus-like driving position, and mediocre-to-poor road dynamics. (I include the VW in this description because even though it was rear-engined, it took no significant ergonomic advantage of the recovered space in the front.)

A minivan starts from a car platform, and is scaled up from there. The seating position is preserved, as is a substantial portion of the driving experience. It's a car that looks and acts like a van.

There is a lot of size and form variation on the minivan in other markets. But somewhat surprisingly, the United States tolerates essentially no deviation from the basic Chrysler minivan formula. There are only three unambiguously successful minivans in the U.S. market right now--the Chrysler, the Honda Odyssey, and the Toyota Sienna--and only a car geek can tell them apart at a glance. They're far closer to cookie-cutter cars than any of the blobmobiles that followed the Ford Taurus ever were.

Many vehicles that deviated substantially from this formula have come and gone. Some came out in the early days when manufacturers were trying to understand this new kind of car, and others appeared long after manufacturers should have known better. A few examples:

The Old Small Van
Toyota and Nissan both tried these, the former more successfully (particularly given that the Nissan was prone to engine fires). The Chevrolet Astro/GMC Safari fits the description too, though calling it "small" is pushing it. It's oldthink at 5/8 scale, and it doesn't work. (Though if you're going to build a replica of the Scooby Doo Mystery Machine, I suggest starting with a Toyota Van. It looks an awful lot like it.)

The Tall Wagon
All minivans are tall wagons in a sense, but I'm talking about a vehicle that's very much like a station wagon with a tall roof, including four conventional doors. Mitsubishi tried hard to make these stick with the Colt Vista, and later (with added sliding doors) the Expo. Honda's first Odyssey was the same kind of vehicle.

I understand this market failure the least. It's a practical package, and Honda had already had some success with a four-door Civic with much the same form factor. Moreover, most of the same thing is making it with some crossover SUVs, like the Chrysler Pacifica and Toyota Highlander/RX-series. Go figure.

The Spacecraft
In hindsight, it's difficult to understand a manufacturer choosing what it should consider a bread-and-butter family vehicle as a platform for radical experimentation, but that's what several of them did. GM's first car-based minivans were just weird, with pointy snouts, four-foot-deep dashboards, and taillights in the greenhouse. Especially in white, they looked uncannily like Dustbusters. Nissan built a flying doorstop called the Axxess, and Toyota's graduation from old small van-dom was the Previa, a jellybeanish contraption with the engine mounted in the middle of the vehicle, under the floor.

Manufacturers, if you're going to build us Americans a minivan, here are the things to remember:

• American minivans are all the same size.
• They're all conservatively styled.
• They all have similar handling and power.
• They all have the same sorts of creature comforts.
• They all have dual sliding doors.
• They all have customizable seating for up to seven people.

Right or wrong, that's what an American minivan is. Copy what's succeeding already. Deviate from this formula at your considerable peril.

Thanks to fr.gizmodo.com for the VW image, chrysler.com for the Town & Country image, wikimedia.org for the Toyota image, leegodden.com for the Colt Vista image, and wickedbodies.net for the Lumina APV image.