CITROEN C5 X PHEV

Fastback has a lot to live up to and mostly just parts bin kit to do it with – and yet…

- STEVE CROPLEY

Not so long ago, when French autoroutes were paragons of motoring freedom and stories of biker-gendarmes marching errant motorists to cashpoints were non-existent, another glorious automotive phenomenon was common on the motorways of France.

It was the Big Citroën, a low and graceful conveyance with decisively different styling from the executive car norm. It never seemed to travel at less than three-figure speeds (in MPH) and carried its serene occupants with a supple stability that eluded everything else on the road, especially the pricier, brasher Germans.

There was a 60-year run of these big Citroëns – DS, CX, XM, C6 to name four – all with unique technology and very different driving characteristics. Sadly, it ended with the last C6, roughly 10 years ago. The cars were all dogged by the same problem: too small an export market to balance their high cost of development and manufacture.

In Britain, especially, their rates of depreciation resembled that of a piano falling from the fifth floor. Citroën’s marketeers knew the problem but couldn’t resist forcing cars down the sales pipeline. Values collapsed. Other models and the firm’s reputation suffered. For this and other reasons, the glorious lineage ended.