Volvo C30 road test

The Christian festival of Argos is the time we are likely to feel our age.
Parties become sitting down social events. Dancing a distant memory of Barry White and platform soles. Now it’s absent minded mouthing of the words to I’m Every Woman and one of Nigella’s special recipe vol-au-vents.
Oh, and you haven’t a clue who or what the Mighty Boosh is.
Sadly with age, cars come to be appreciated as ‘sensible’ and ‘practical’.
Models that were once avoided like a morning church service become attractive for thire comfortable seats and all the passive safety features of a warm bosom.
Lord knows how it happens but one night you go to bed wanting to drive like Sebastien Loeb and next day wake up a senior accountant with Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu.
What really gives the ageing game away is one simple phrase: ‘I remember when...’
Bringing us geriatrically to the Volvo C30.
There will be many who remember when Volvo last had a dabble in the sports coupe hatch market. At a time when most of its design cues were taken from house bricks the 480 was modelled on a wedge of cartoon cheese.
It was, however, popular with younger drivers, professionals mainly and that is the aim of the C30, to take sales from the BMW 1 Series and the Audi A3.
Firstly, full respect to the man with the pencil who has elk sausage sandwiches for lunch. Although the C30 is essentially an S40 with 22cm lopped off it is a drawing board triumph. A compact three-door hatchback with an airy cabin.
It also has looks, right down to an effective all glass tailgate that was a big feature of the ill-starred 480 cheesy wotsit.
If there is one area of disappointment it is the arthouse but Spartan fascia with its dearth of instrumentation.
Built not in Sweden but Ghent, Belgium, the stage could have been set for something less exciting than half day closing. The C30, however, is satisfying on the road, the first affordable Volvo for a long time that captures the heart as well is being Captain Sensible.
Being driven was the good-as-gold 1.8 FlexiFuel which runs on petrol and bioethanol and costs £17,800 for the SE trim.It is hardly what you would call fast with a top speed of 124mph and a leisurely 0-60 stroll of 10.8 seconds.
Standard equipment leans towards safety with creature comforts limited more or less to a radio, electric windows and cruise control.
Of course, more importantly at my age, the seats are very nice and the biggest danger in a crash is waking up in the middle of a balloon dance.
So, if your knees still serve any useful function try the C30. From a more mature perspective I see the less than busy fascia as having plenty of room for a blue badge.