Pickup trucks can be wonderful things. They're handy, have room for four passengers, can be ordered with four-wheel or all-wheel drive and often have just as much glamour and charisma as cars do.

But pickups can be a pain. They can be thirsty, noisy, slow-moving and absolute hell to try to park anyplace -- if you can find a space that fits.

For those reasons, it's no surprise that one of the growing niches in the industry is small to midsize pickups. They have all of the advantages of the big pickups and almost none of their disadvantages.

2004 GMC Canyon Crew Cab (top photo) and crew cab seating arrangement (bottom photo). Click photo for larger image.

One of the best buys in this field also happens to be one of the newest: The 2004 GMC Canyon. It comes in two-wheel- and four-wheel-drive varieties, regular and extended- cab models, and a variety of trim levels -- all told, there are 22 models available.

Power comes from a 175-horsepower, four-cylinder engine or a 3.5-liter 220-horsepower, 5-cylinder engine. Fuel economy on the V-6 I tested was 17 city and 22 highway.

Our test model, a four-wheel drive Z71 SLE Crew Cab, had a base price of $27,210. Options that included leather seating, off-road suspension, reading lamps and a leather-wrapped steering wheel brought the final price to $30,735.

GMC points out several improvements in the Canyon over its predecessor, the Sonoma. The regular cab model extends 4 inches more than the old model, and there are 3 more inches of storage space behind the optional reclining bucket seats. The Canyon has a jazzier look, too, with a more aggressive grille and more interesting character lines along the flanks.

The interior is one of the more comfortable ones you'll find. There's plenty of room to stretch out, all the gauges are in places that make sense, and the leather interior looked and felt good.

I did have problem reaching the seat adjustment buttons on the side of the seat -- there was little room for my hand to grope to find the control. And there seemed to be a lot of plastic for a $30,000 truck that hopes to compete with the Nissan Frontier, the Toyota Tacoma and the Dodge Dakota. And the rear cup holder mounted between the seats rattled too much for my tastes.

But GMC, like other General Motors divisions, has recently been showing signs that it's getting the message about the quality of its interiors, so I would expect to see further improvements soon.

As for driving, it was absolutely quiet on the road, and you don't get any of the annoying feedback from the surface that you get from other trucks when the bed is empty. The steering responsiveness and decent brakes -- along with its modest, easy-to-park size -- made the pickup a pleasure to drive in the city, city dwellers being a market GMC hopes to attract with the Canyon.