Police Car Archives - Page 2 of 2

Shopping For A Police Car In China

A Volkswagen Passat Lingyu on the 2010 China International Exhibition on Police Equipment (CIEPE), held in the beautiful Beijing Exhibition Center in northwest Beijing. Sadly, the show has since moved to the less pretty China National Convention Center.

The show was about all sorts of police equipment, ranging from guns to uniforms to surveillance cameras. Great fun. But even better were the police cars, displayed by car makers hoping for a deal with the cops. Some of these cars did eventually make it into real police cars, others didn’t. The Passat Lingyu, like the Passats before it, would have a long police career. Continue reading “Shopping For A Police Car In China”

A Volkswagen Santana 2000 Police-Fire Car In The Rain In Beijing

A Volkswagen Santana 2000 in heavy rain in Beijing. Note the cool Xiali sedan in the background on the right.

This vehicle belongs to fire prevention and control (消防) department of the police, so it is a bit of both a police car and a fire brigade car. The white license plate are used by the police, People’s Armed Police (PAP), and by the armed forces.

I took this photo in 2010, when the old white license plates were still in use. WJ stands for wujing (武警), a collective abbreviation police and armed forces. 31 stands for Beijing.

The Santana 2000 was one of many Santana variants manufactured by the SAIC-Volkswagen joint venture in Shanghai. It was rather rare to see Shanghai-made cars in public service in Beijing, as the local government mostly bought locally-made cars, like Hyundai’s and Beijing’s and such.

In any way, with so much rain the fire fighters probably had an easy night!

Mistubishi Outlander Police Car In China

A very neat Mitsubishi Outlander police car in Beijing, capital of China. The first generation Outlander was manufactured by Beijing-Jeep. This odd arrangement dates from the days of Daimler-Chrysler, which also held a stake in Mitsubishi.

Chrysler had the long-running Beijing-Jeep joint venture in China, producing the Cherokee and Grand Cherokee. Daimler-Chrysler added the Chrysler 300C, the Chrysler Sebring, Mercedes-Benz E-Class, the Pajero Sport, and this Outlander to the line-up.

White license plates are used by police, paramilitary police, and the armed forces. The black character on the left is jing, short for Beijing (北京). The character on the right is another jing, short for Jingcha (警察), also see bonnet, and that means police.

The Haima Family Makes For A Nice Mazda-based Police Car In China

This sweet little white sedan is a Haima Family, based on the Mazda 323 Familia. The Haima Family was one of those super basic cheap Chinese sedans, but sadly it was never able to compete with cars like the Volkswagen Jetta or Ciroen Elysee.
Continue reading “The Haima Family Makes For A Nice Mazda-based Police Car In China”