Mayor Alan Arakawa’s executive assistant, Don Couch, drives an environment-friendly hybrid automobile and his other car is far from a limo, too.
by: Joseph W. Bean
Back in early June I came across the surprising fact that Don Couch drives a hybrid car. I admit it: The surprise was that, like everyone I know, I thought of this kind of eco-thoughtfulness as Democratic, almost by definition.
I’ve been hearing about these cars for a while, just like you, but I didn’t know anyone who actually drove one. I took a picture of Couch and his wife, Leslie, a former Maui Weekly employee, with their car for the Movers and Shakers column. I also promised myself I’d find out more about the car soon, and write about it.
Next time I ran into Couch and his car -a Toyota Prius- he was taking a day off from his job at the County Building to help sign people up for the Hawai’i Prescription Plus program in both Kihei and Lahaina.
The Prius had been turned into a campaign-mobile by then, but I figured the story could be told, politics notwithstanding. The Don Couch story is a little touchy to have outside the campaign news section right now. The car is running for no office. So let me tell you how great it is.
The famous thing is that it pollutes so much less because it runs mostly on a permanent-magnet, AC-synchronous motor that is rated at 67 horsepower. The less famous thing is the cool internal combustion engine it uses for starting and special conditions: aluminum, double overhead cam, 16 valves and four cylinders. Then there’s the interior space which is huge for a five-passenger car, both in the passenger space (96.2 cubic feet) and the luggage space (16.1 cubic feet). All of which pales when you notice the Prius is also a handsome, streamlined design.
The mileage is impressive, even if the savings on gas takes a very long time to recoup when you consider that the hybrid car costs $2,000 to $6,000 more than comparable all-gas vehicles. Still, the official rating of up to 60 miles per gallon (60/51/55) looks good beside 33 for the Camry, 36 for the Matrix and even 40 for the Corolla.
Granted, it’s all good, but how do drivers who actually have experience with the hybrids feel about them? Betty Beggs, a Kihei community activist, doesn’t own one, but she spent five weeks with one on the Mainland, and she was “very impressed.” Don and Leslie Couch have had theirs since March 1, and they’re still excited about it.
When I asked Couch, “What’s your other car?” I was ready to hear of something big and flashy -don’t ask why- but no. “Geo Metro,” he said.
I guess that while Don was out signing up people for the state prescription discount plan, Leslie was driving the Geo.
Wondering what the Prius replaced? “It was a Mercury Tracer. We drove it till it died,” Couch said. “Well, we drove it till it almost died, then we donated it to the Kidney Foundation.”
Couch is a big man, Leslie is pretty small, but they both love the very unusual seats in the Prius. They were sure they wouldn’t find a car that would please them and inspire them to put out the money new cars cost, but Couch saw the Prius in Las Vegas (Says he was there on business.) and test drove it on a hill, thinking of Haleakala. He liked the performance. Then Leslie got to test drive one on O’ahu. She was sold too. The waiting list to get a Prius anywhere was months long… except that there was this one deep red one on Maui that people were bypassing for some reason.
“Red, Don?” the salesman asked.
“Yeah, OK, if Leslie likes it.” So he e-mailed her a picture of the car and asked, “Red, Leslie?” Apparently, she said something like, “Yeah, sure.”
The good news is that while other people were paying premium prices for their cars, the Couches got their Prius at the manufacturer’s suggested retail, flat, because no one else was bidding on the red one.
Granted, air pollution is hardly a problem on Maui thanks to the trade winds, but we can still contribute less to the world’s burden of polluting gases. We can still fight back about imported oil for gas production by using less gas. We can certainly be pleased by another feature of the hybrid car in our island paradise: When it’s running on its electric motor, it makes no noise at all.
There are a dozen other forward-looking features of the Prius, but you can look into those when you go check out the cars. You’ll really be amazed about some of them. Ask the salesman right away why you don’t need to use your key to start the car.
As I said above, it’s all good.