100 Cars That Changed History

“Toyota Prius C” by Fletcher6 – Own work. Licensed under CC BY 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

96. Toyota Prius 1997-present Japan

The Prius was a compact sedan, now a full electric hybrid mid-sized hatchback, designed and produced by the Toyota Motor Company. The fully electric hybrid was one of the first of its kind, and managed to produce a mid-sized car that didn’t feel like it was going to blow off the highway with one good gust of wind. The EPA rated it the cleanest car, as far as emissions go, available on the US market. The Prius is a pioneer of an industry struggling to reconcile environmental concerns with consumer demand for larger vehicles. Bottom line, if you want people other than environmentalists to drive hybrids, you have to design them to look and feel more like the cars the market is buying. Toyota did that successfully with the Prius.