While visiting the Granville Island Market in Vancouver, we spotted this gorgeous and beautifully-maintained Citroen 2CV, a late-years example of the car that ended the day of the horse as France’s rural transportation and became a youth lifestyle by the late 1970s, when this one was built.
The 2CV came from the same idea as the Volksvagen—a ‘people’s car’ that could be afforded by ordinary folks. In France’s case, it was aimed at rural farm areas, where the horse was king into the 1930s. Citroen kept the car in production, with incremental changes, from 1948 to 1990, and sold well over 4 million in various forms including small trucks.
The updated square taillights and round turn-signals in the fender tell you it’s an 80s model, like the one driven by James Bond in For Your Eyes Only. An identical twin of this one, red and all, is in the Glasgow Automotive Museum in Scotland.
Despite selling initially for half the price of a Beetle, it was not only cheap, it was an innovative triumph of minimalism, with everything built to be easily maintained or repaired. It used to be said that 5 Francs and a wrench could buy you any repair you needed. And: It was the very first car to have Michelin’s newly-invented radial tires!
