DEARBORN, MI – R.L. Polk & Co., a provider of automotive market data, has certified that Ford has four times more full-size vans on the road with 250,000 miles or more than any other competitor. Ford’s new 2008 Ford E-Series will hit the road in August.

“There are quadruple the number of Ford E-Series vans with 250,000 miles or more on the road than anyone else,” said Joe Castelli, director, Ford Commercial Truck Marketing, which kicked off its research last year.

Polk certified the 250,000-mile durability claim for Ford by tracing odometer readings recorded during maintenance stops of all operable vans.

VPSI, the world’s largest provider of van pooling vehicles, is one of Ford’s largest van customers. Started by a group of Chrysler employees in 1977, the company has since almost completely shifted its fleet of full-size vans — about 3,000 total — to Ford E-Series models. Today, VPSI estimates that this dependability equates to a 42-percent savings in maintenance and service costs.

The E-Series vanpool vehicles achieve 150 passenger miles per gallon with multiple customers riding in each van. Van pooling is on the rise with VPSI’s North American operations in 50 major urban markets growing more than 30 percent in the past three years. VPSI estimates its fleet of vehicles reduces 650 million miles of vehicle travel and 250,000 tons of carbon dioxide pollution each year.

Ford’s leading number of high-mileage vans includes more than a few customers who have logged 1 million miles. The 1991 E-Series van operated by the HealthSouth Rehabilitation Hospital in Kingsport, Tenn., is closing in on this milestone with about 950,000 miles recorded during two-and-a-half decades of picking up and dropping off wheelchair patients in the northeastern corner of the state.