Defining Characteristics of a Minivan

"Jay, the practical enthusiast" (jay-m) 10/30/2018 at 10:15 • Filed to: None

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I had my Mazda5 for about a month before I realized that it is not a minivan. It’s almost a minivan; maybe a micro-van. I think in other parts of the world it belongs in a class of vehicle called MPVs but I’m not sure if that classification includes minivans as well.

I’ve heard a lot of people say that third row SUVs are just minivans. Although they are taking the place of and being used as minivans, they aren’t minivans because they lack one important feature.

To me, minivans need to have 3 defining characteristics:

1. Third row seating. In the Mazda, as well as in many other minivans and SUVs, the third row seats can be folded flat to expand the usable storage area. So the Mazda is a minivan in this sense, but it is too narrow to be a true minivan. Real minivans have 2 2 3 (or 2 3 3) seating but the Mazda only has 2 2 2 seating. M ost, if not all of the 3 rd row SUVs have the same seating capacity as a minivan.

Not so easy to see, but there are 3 rows of seats (the last row has the headrests down).

2. Sliding rear door(s). This is what really sets apart minivans from third row SUVs. Sliding rear doors are the most magical things if you have children, especially ones that need car seats. There is no easier way to buckle up kids than to just move the whole door out of your way. This is unbelievably useful if you are parked too closely to the car next to you.

So easy to get those kids in and out of there.

3. Cargo space behind the third row of seats. Minivans and full size SUVs have this in common. The Sienna, Odyssey, and Escalade all have space to put suitcases behind their 3 rd rows. This is where the Mazda5 really fails as a minivan. When the rear seats are being used, there is almost no usable space behind them.

Now that we are a family of 5 it really limits how much cargo we can carry.

So, although I wanted a minivan, and my car looks like a minivan, I don’t think it is a minivan. I still tell people I drive a minivan, because if it is not a minivan, than what it is?

Nibby > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 10:17

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it’s clearly a 4WD offroad SUV

Ash78, voting early and often > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 10:19

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I agree with your assessment, but I have expanded the “sliding rear doors” to be “alternative opening rear doors” to include weird workarounds like the Tesla Model X. I consider that a minivan.

I feel like cars such as the Ford Flex and Mercedes R-Class just barely pass the test. Their rear doors are so large and impractical, they should have been sliders.

facw > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 10:24

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I’d say the 5 is a minivan. I would even go so far as to sliding doors aren’t required (Things like the first- gen MPV, first-gen Odyssey, or the current Ford Galaxy strike me as obvious minivans despite conventional doors). If we actually called things MPVs here in the US maybe things would switch around, but we don’t, and frankly there’s enough overlap that I am fine with saying that MPVs can be minivans and vice versa.

For me you are really looking at any 3-row vehicle with a low floor and high ceiling.  

someassemblyrequired > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 10:35

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I wanted to check out a  Mazda5 when we were looking at vans, but I talked to a colleague at work that had one and he said “great for one kid, tough for two.” That and the price difference being almost negligible with the larger FCA vans kinda ended the Mazda talk.  We ended up getting one with nearly every option box checked for a couple of grand more than a mid-range Mazda 5. 

But I agree, sliding doors are the bees knees with kids.

MasterMario - Keeper of the V8s > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 10:40

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I consider the 5 a minivan...a small one sure, but it’s still a minivan. My definition is 3 rows, unibody, sliding doors.

This post just reminded me of a funny conversation I had with my wife.

Me: You really should just get a minivan. They have as much room as a full size SUV, better fuel economy, and easier for kids to get in and out of. Not to mention quite a bit cheaper.

Wife: No, I will not drive a minivan. I want a Tahoe or a Suburban.

M: That’s going to be such a pain getting kids in and out of.

W: I’d rather deal with it than drive a minivan. Why don’t they make a Suburban with a sliding door?

M: ???

M: You mean a van?

W: No, like a suburban, just with a sliding door.

M: Yea, that would be a van. You want a Ford Transit/Chevy Express/Nissan NV?

W: No, I want a Tahoe or Suburban, just with a sliding door.

M:

Jay, the practical enthusiast > MasterMario - Keeper of the V8s 10/30/2018 at 10:49

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I’m with your wife on the sliding doors. So many p eople in the U.S. need a minivan but refuse to buy one because of their “not cool” image. I think if you put sliding doors on 3rd row SUVs (and maybe raise the roof a little) people will have a more practical vehicle without the negative stigma of minivans.

LongbowMkII > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 10:49

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If you’ve got five you just drop one of those seats. Boom cargo!

Jay, the practical enthusiast > LongbowMkII 10/30/2018 at 10:51

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That is definitely how it will be.

Jay, the practical enthusiast > Ash78, voting early and often 10/30/2018 at 10:56

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I don’t think the Model X had 3rd row seats though.

I didn’t realize the Flex had 3rd row seats, but without the sliding doors I feel like it is still a station wagon. Same with the R-Class. Although in both of these cases I think they didn’t do sliding doors to make sure that they wouldn’t get the dreaded minivan label.

Duck Duck Grey Duck FTMFW! > MasterMario - Keeper of the V8s 10/30/2018 at 10:57

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I had a similar kind of argument when my wife was looking for a new car. She had a Mitsubishi Pajero when she lived in Japan and when she was shopping for a new car here she wanted to buy a car that got 35 + mpg and had a button on the dash that engaged 4WD like her Pajero did. My mechanic friend and I told her such a car does not exist in the United States. She settled for a Subaru Impreza. It took forever to convince her.

Textured Soy Protein > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 10:57

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It’s a mini minivan.

Really it’s an MPV but nobody in the US knows what that means, even though...

Mazda’s original minivan without sliding doors was called the MPV.

Ash78, voting early and often > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 10:58

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Yep, the X and the Flex are both three rows (X might be optional, but it’s a huge selling point). They are all definitely trying to dodge being called a minivan.

Jay, the practical enthusiast > facw 10/30/2018 at 11:06

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I think if you do away with the sliding door requirement then a lot of 3rd row SUVs are going to fit into the minivan category.

I feel like sliding doors are so important that maybe t he first gen Odyssey and the Galaxy are something else. Maybe a type of station wagon.

shop-teacher > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 11:08

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Disagree. Your van is the most minivan of all the vans. When minivans first came out, most of them offered very little cargo capacity behind the third row, but some people would buy the extended versi on, or the less mini minivan , so that there would be decent storage space behind the thir d row. Over time, the extended versions became more and more popular, so much so that what used to be the regular versions ... the most mini versions ... got dropped from the lineup. I argue that the current slate of minivans, are not very mini anymore. They’re only small in comparison to full size vans, but they’re actually pretty darn big.  

MasterMario - Keeper of the V8s > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 11:10

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That’s just a full size van though. So you really just want a more rugged looking full size van?

facw > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 11:11

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I think the SUVs/crossovers get weeded out by having higher floors/offroad pretensions.  

Jay, the practical enthusiast > someassemblyrequired 10/30/2018 at 11:13

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We got a base model (Sport) with an automatic for $19,500. I honestly didn’t check on any of the FCA vans because I was worried about long term reliability. I do wish we had gotten a higher trim. This was our first new car purchase and we learned to never get the base model.

What vehicle did you end up getting and how has it been?

Jay, the practical enthusiast > Textured Soy Protein 10/30/2018 at 11:15

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Alright, yes, that.... .what?!

How...how do you get your kids in that? Please tell me that just has 1 door on the other side like the old Honda Stepwagons.

Jay, the practical enthusiast > shop-teacher 10/30/2018 at 11:17

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Wish I could give you more stars. This is something I didn’t know about. I was just comparing current minivans and didn’t think about their history.

Urambo Tauro > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 11:19

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What about station wagons? One of the most fundamental aspects of vans/minivans that sets them apart from other vehicles is how the cargo area is a shared space with the passenger cabin (as opposed to a truck bed or car trunk). I feel like I know the difference between a van, minivan, and station wagon when I see it, but it’s hard to put into words. I’m probably relying too much on the exterior styling. Part of me thinks that height is a key way to tell them apart, but with so many varieties out there, I’m not sure where to draw the line. And with all the platform-sharing going on these days, it might not be as simple as saying that wagons are “car-based”.

Jay, the practical enthusiast > Nibby 10/30/2018 at 11:19

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I think the future of the minivan is sliding door 3rd row SUVs. Marketing people will find a way to convince buyers that they are not  minivans.

functionoverfashion > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 11:25

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Weirdly, there used to only be a door on the right hand side. Our 80's and 90's chrysler minivans were all like that. When they put a door on the other side, we were like, “WOW LOOK AT THAT!” but we never had one. 

functionoverfashion > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 11:31

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Flat floor is a huge defining characteristic to me. We grew up with minivans. Always plenty of room for the four of us, plus stuff, dogs, whatever. Then on a camping trip out west (we’re from the east) we rented a 90's Ford Explorer and we were astonished how much less cargo space there was. Our vans were all the short ones, too. Having a rear axle back there and the added ground clearance makes a massive difference in interior space.

Also:

2019 Suburban cargo volume, all seats folded - 121.7 cubic feet

2019 Honda Odyssey cargo volume (no seats) - 144.9 cubic feet.

Those things are huge.

Jay, the practical enthusiast > functionoverfashion 10/30/2018 at 11:36

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I didn’t know about all that cargo space. The 5 has considerably less, but I still use it like a small truck with all the seats folded.

Jay, the practical enthusiast > Urambo Tauro 10/30/2018 at 11:39

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I still feel like it comes down to the doors. Sliding doors = minivan, conventional doors (even with 3rd row seating) = wagon.

Urambo Tauro > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 11:47

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Is this a minivan?

Jay, the practical enthusiast > MasterMario - Keeper of the V8s 10/30/2018 at 11:50

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I'm all about the practicality. Put sliding doors on every vehicle!

MasterMario - Keeper of the V8s > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 11:52

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I’m not arguing against sliding doors ...I’m just saying it already exists.

Jay, the practical enthusiast > Urambo Tauro 10/30/2018 at 12:06

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Well...oddly enough I think so.

shop-teacher > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 12:45

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This is why Oppo is great. We can have random civilized discussions about all manor of automotive topics :)

shop-teacher > MasterMario - Keeper of the V8s 10/30/2018 at 12:47

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If child #2 had been twins, I was totally going to get a fullsize van.

MasterMario - Keeper of the V8s > shop-teacher 10/30/2018 at 12:50

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I’d definitely rock a full size van if the need arose. 

shop-teacher > functionoverfashion 10/30/2018 at 12:51

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GM neutered the cargo space of the current gen Suburban and Tahoe by not having the rear seats be removable. Having them fold down on top of a solid rear axle has made the load floor ridiculously high. Hopefully for the next gen they will stop this madness. If the seats must stay in the vehicle , you need an independent rear suspension.

bhtooefr > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 12:53

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So, let’s look at the defining vehicle of the genre, to start with. Note that the minivan name is American, to contrast with the American full-size vans.

So, the defining characteristics:

* Similar footprint to the compact (what we’d now consider midsize) car platform it was based on (note, however, that many competing designs were based on truck platforms)

* Taller roofline, to provide enough space for three rows of seating (two-row models were available, though) to replace a large American station wagon (which historically had three rows of seating, the rear row being rear-facing or two side-facing benches)

* Low enough to fit in a typical garage with room to spare

* Easy access to the rear seating area through a sliding door

I’m not sure how strict the sliding door test is, though, but the rest is critical - if it doesn’t fit in a garage easily, it’s not a minivan. I actually suspect the Tesla Model X may fail the test for being too wide , although the third row isn’t as useful as modern minivans.

Mazda5? Clearly a minivan.

Something like a Toyota TownAce (which was rushed into the US market to compete against the Chrysler minivans) ? I’d also consider it a minivan, even in the context of its home market (where a HiAce is the full-size van).

Volkswagen Transporter? This is interesting because there are now bigger vans in its market , but the Transporter was the direct inspiration for American full-size vans, and it’s definitely larger than American minivans, so I’m inclined to say it’s not one.

Fiat 600 Multipla? Now this is an interesting one - IIRC, conventional doors, but a taller roofline to enable three rows of seating in a Fiat 600 (compact) footprint is there, so I suspect that it’s actually directly in the spirit of a minivan.

Kei vans? They don’t get three rows, and many are on dedicated van/truck platforms (not all, though, and the Subaru Sambar, one of the pioneering ones, shared the 360's platform IIRC), but they’re aiming directly for carrying four people and a lot of cargo comfortably in a normal kei car’s four-seater footprint. There, “microvan” might actually apply, because of the impossibility of a third row.

Textured Soy Protein > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 13:02

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There was one swing-out rear door on the passenger side. Eventually Mazda added a second swing-out door on the driver side.

someassemblyrequired > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 13:24

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We got a Town and Country. I have actually been kind of surprised. Mechanically no complaints after 90K , but it does have the heavy-duty brake package (massive, stolen directly from a Ram 1500) which helps reduce their tendency to go through brakes - first set lasted over 60,000 miles . A couple of semi-major electrical gremlins, but it’s been good to us so far, and the fact it will happily swallow lots of stuff (including 4x8' sheets ) means it doubles as a truck.

On the road I think it was $28,750, which is quite a bit higher, but again it’s pretty high spec (leather, DVD, nav, all the safety gee-gaws and upgraded sound system ).

Jay, the practical enthusiast > bhtooefr 10/30/2018 at 13:42

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You, s hop-teacher (and quite a few others) have brought me up to speed on minivan history and quite a few things I hadn’t thought of (such as a flat floors ).

As much as I want to insist on sliding doors being a requirement, it seems like historically they weren't. It's not so easy to define vehicle categories 

bhtooefr > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 13:56

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Another way to look at it may be floor height vs. roof height.

A minivan has SUV-like (at minimum over 60", ideally over 65") roof height, but with car-like floor height and ground clearance (let’s say under 7", as that’s one of the tests for whether a vehicle is a truck or a car, if the axles have 7" or more of clearance).

functionoverfashion > shop-teacher 10/30/2018 at 14:06

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Oh wow I didn’t realize that. Yeah, that would take up a ton of room!

Jay, the practical enthusiast > someassemblyrequired 10/30/2018 at 14:08

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That’s good to hear. We rented one before we bought the Mazda and lo ved it (it had leather but not the DVD player). Our problem was we had a $ 20K budget. It was either buy used or get the 5. After living with it for 4 years I’m still not sure if we made the right choice.

someassemblyrequired > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 14:14

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Yeah my biggest gripe with FCA honestly is that about half their dealers are total garbage. I think their vehicles would have a better reputation if they got serious about pulling franchises from bad dealers. We move around a lot, and the selling dealer was fantastic, but after we moved the dealer closest to us was a gong show, which meant having to drive quite a bit out of our way to get to a good dealer (FCA dealers are few and far between in the PNW, even in the big cities ).

Jay, the practical enthusiast > someassemblyrequired 10/30/2018 at 14:59

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Im going to have to write a few articles about the car buying experience. Mazda was fantastic (they let us take one home for the weekend even after I said I wouldn’t buy it in the colors they had). We used truecar (it was actually 19,100, I got the numbers wrong) and they didn’t haggle over the price or anything.

I wish car makers could understand just how important the dealership experience is and how many dealers cost them sales.

Jay, the practical enthusiast > MasterMario - Keeper of the V8s 10/30/2018 at 15:01

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Im a little slow this morning. Yeah...that’s it.

It took me all day to put 2 and 2 together and understand what you were saying. Even after you spelled it out. 

someassemblyrequired > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 15:02

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Can’t agree more - you’ll have a much better experience buying a Mazda 2 than you will buying a Cadillac.

Jay, the practical enthusiast > Textured Soy Protein 10/30/2018 at 15:04

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Im still torn on the lack of sliding doors. But for history's sake I'll allow it. 

shop-teacher > functionoverfashion 10/30/2018 at 15:59

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Yeah, it does.  Next time you see one with the rear hatch open, get a load of how high the load floor is.  It’s redonkulous!

RT > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 18:19

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If so, it might be the first.

1982! Almost two year s before t he Espace and Caravan.

Proof that early Japanese cars didn’t copy - they innovated.

Jay, the practical enthusiast > RT 10/30/2018 at 18:43

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But what about Volkswagen ? Aren’t those early minivans?

BaconSandwich is tasty. > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/30/2018 at 22:03

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If the 5 was another foot longer for more storage behind the rear seats, it'd be perfect.

Jay, the practical enthusiast > BaconSandwich is tasty. 10/30/2018 at 22:29

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E xcept now I want storage capacity and an extra seat (for when the in laws come and visit).

Jesse > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/31/2018 at 06:49

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If you really think about it the sliding doors are absolutely required for a modern mini-van(early generations get a pass) because of one vehicle...the Aztek. It was the first anti-minivan crossover that was a Chevy minivan with four doors and a two stage tailgate/hatch. I missed my Aztek until I got an Olds Silhouette...now I miss them bother but my Flex Eco is pretty awesome minus some cargo space.

RT > Jay, the practical enthusiast 10/31/2018 at 09:02

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Aren’t those just vans with windows though? Volkswagen wasn’t the first to create that type of vehicle anyway.

Since the Nissan Prarie brought the extra seats and sliding doors to a car-like shell, I’d call it closer to a modern MPV.