It was in the 1950s when the Ford Motor Company first produced the rear wheel drive vehicle known as the Ford Crown Victoria.
The name of the vehicle was later employed when the full size LTD line was shrunk as a means of competing with the downsized Chevrolet Caprice vehicle. Chrysler and AMC dropped out of the full size car market, leaving the Ford Crown Victoria to be the main vehicle in its class after the Chevrolet Caprice was discontinued by General Motors. Nowadays, however, the rear drive Chrysler LX platform and the Chevrolet Impala are significant new challenges to this particular segment of the market. The Ford Crown Victoria is a mid priced full size sedan in the Ford vehicle line up.
In January 2007, Ford sold a record 5,424 Crown Victorias. This by far exceeded sales of the newer vehicle the Ford Five Hundred, which is a more technologically advanced vehicle with similar passenger space.
While the front wheel drive platforms have proven to be more popular among customers, they still have not challenged the dominance of the Ford Crown Victoria as a police car, taxi cab, and fleet vehicle. Ford even sells a longer wheelbase version of the car for taxi use.
