Remembering the Plymouth Voyager III: The Transforming 2-in-1 Car that Never Was

The Plymouth Voyager III concept is one such design. It's also a concept that was lost to time and never made it even close to production, but one that's not entirely meritless. If anything, it perfectly captured the conflicting trends that motivated automakers at the time, and it showed how Chrysler, through Plymouth, aimed to prepare for the future.

The Voyager III came at a time when the first alarm signals were being sounded about the climate crisis. Despite the need for greener transport and/or smaller vehicles with reduced carbon footprints, demand for vans was skyrocketing. The Voyager III tried to make these two conflicting needs exist in the same space, with decidedly dated styling and advantages that would have translated into more convenience for the daily user.

Built in 1989 and brought for the first time on display at the 1990 Auto Show in Detroit, the Voyager III was described as a "socially-responsible vehicle-within-a-vehicle" that wanted to challenge "conventional automotive design" to "address future transportation issues" – the same kind of issues we're hearing about today, such as global warming, air quality, congestion, and the need to find alternative fuels.

It was a vehicle comprised of two separate vehicles, at least in theory. It was a miniature tractor-trailer, just a bit longer than a real van, the Plymouth Grand Voyager, but with more functionality thanks to its 2-in-1 design.

The front was a microcar with a dropped axle that retracted into the body when it mated to the rear module, which was a van. The idea was that you'd buy one car but get two for the same price: a city car you'd take to work and city errands and a van you could use for family vacations or family drives.

As Bob Lutz, the then-president of Chrysler, explained at the trade show, "You see people going into downtown areas in full-size vans wasting fuel and clogging up space. It seemed to us like a neat idea to be able to leave two-thirds of your vehicle at home."

This would free up space in the city and would alleviate congestion and reduce pollution. The microcar offered seating for three people, including the driver, and would be powered by a 1.5-liter engine running on alternative fuel, maybe propane.

The rear module would get its own engine, but the driver would be able to opt whether to operate the vehicle on just one or both at the same time, depending on the payload and where they were driving. This second engine was a 2.2-liter turbo engine mated with a four-speed overdrive automatic transaxle, and could also be used to power an electric microcar in the front. When used together, the vehicle would boast a total of 250 hp and all-wheel drive.

Plymouth imagined the 2-in-1 vehicle as modular, future-proofing it. The microcar could be electric at some point, or the van module could be switched up with a flat-bed pickup module or a boat trailer module, or it could come with different layouts that included, among other things, a bed.

The unit they brought to the Detroit for the auto show had two rows of seats for a total of five passengers, but they said an optional fold-a-bed could be added. In total, the Voyager III could transport eight people in perfect comfort and there would still be some space left for cargo – though clearly not enough for the kind of luggage a family of eight would be bringing along.

Features include a rear-camera and an overhead console-mounted TV monitor to help the driver direct the microcar into docking into the van module, a trip computer, dual AC and heating units, and "state-of-the-art stereo with individual headphone jacks." Even though the car was up on display at the auto show, only a couple of photos of the interior were ever made public.

The Voyager III was 119 inches (505.5 cm) long and featured smoked glass for the bubbly rear, which allowed for panoramic views without heating up too much. The one thing that designer Tom Gale, the same one who later penned the much better-looking Dodge Viper and Plymouth Prowler, didn't think of was what would happen to the van module if you left it behind, outside the city.

When the two parts came together, the rear glass and the tailgate of the microcar folded down, sitting flush against the floor and thus offering access to the rear passenger and cargo areas. But when you took the microcar out, the van module remained wide open, which meant that you could only unhook the two in a garage, where it would be safe from the elements and thieves.

However, that's not the reason why the Voyager III never came to be. Predictably, what sealed its fate was the incredibly high production costs of such a mutant – one that, we might as well add, didn't even address a concrete, existing need. Putting such a vehicle into production would have meant people paying for two cars but getting just one since the van module was useless by itself.

As the saying goes, we'll always have Paris. Or, in this case, a look into a future that never was.