Sometimes the morning commute is drudgery and sometimes it’s exciting. There I was listening to my XM radio, tooling along through a notorious speed trap on Route 80 East in Passaic County, New Jersey, when a turquoise Ford Escort wagon comes from out of nowhere and blasts past me and a bunch of other cars in the right lane. Next thing I see is a Crown Vic police cruiser with the lights flashing. Immediately I start thinking of excuses when he blows past me in hot pursuit of Mr. Mid ’90s Escort. God those 4.6 Crown Vics are slugs. At this point, the Escort is probably half a mile ahead of him. Then I look in my mirror and here come two more—a state trooper and a Passaic County sheriff’s Dodge Charger. Then an unmarked Crown Vic. Then another trooper. These guys are hauling, but no match for the Escort, which looked bone stock. Mr. Pursuee gets off at an exit, which forces all the Pursuers to scramble from the left lane, across two or three lanes of traffic, onto the exit ramp. Lots and lots of brake lights. Wow, here I am minding my own business and my morning turns into a New Jersey version of Smokey & The Bandit. All I could think was these cops sure could have used some Impala SS police cars. Is there such a thing? I know they make V-6 versions, but is the 5.3 SS available? We had a 2006 Impala SS for a test vehicle in the summer of that year and it was a pretty impressive ride for a front-driver. It ran 14.4s all day long and handled the road course at Raceway Park decently, though nothing special (can you say understeer?). The car was comfortable, got excellent fuel economy and once you figured out how to shift it so 2-3 occurred at 6000 rpm (like 1-2) instead of 5400, it went pretty well on the track. The biggest downside was that the transmission overheat idiot light started glowing after two laps on the road course. Still, I remember thinking it was a good value for the money. Very roomy, with seating for five inside and a four body trunk. A lot of people are clamoring for a rear-drive Impala for the next generation, but my hunch is that it’s not going to happen. Chevy moves north of 300,000 Impalas a year in this country and that’s a number it can’t afford to mess with by going rear-wheel drive. Too bad.