IRVINE, Calif. -

An electric vehicle’s sustained performance for weekly shopping activity at Kelley’s Blue Book’s Kbb.com is leaving the model with momentum going into an important West Coast auto show.

Leading the way on the most recent Hot Car Report from Kbb.com was the 2011 Nissan LEAF. Site analysts determined among all models, the LEAF’s activity level charged up by 73.5 percent, outpacing a pair of units from Volvo, another from Lincoln and one from Ford.

“Like a lightning storm that takes a long time to blow over, the all-electric Nissan LEAF continues to rank at or near the top in Kbb.com’s weekly Hot Car Reports,” analysts noted.

“Next week’s LA Auto Show should continue to draw attention to the LEAF as well as the Chevrolet Volt since California will be one of the initial markets where a buyer will actually be able park one of these innovative vehicles in their garage,” they continued.

And, by the way, the 2011 Volt was among the top five newly introduced or redesigned models that posted the greatest amount of shopping activity growth. Kbb.com indicated the activity for this unit moved up by 14.4 percent.

Beyond the discussion about electric vehicles, site analysts went into more detail about the activity growth of those two Volvo units.

Among all models, the Volvo S60 spiked 58.6 percent to trail only the LEAF. The Volvo XC90 wasn’t far off that growth pace at 25.3 percent.

“The Volvo brand is seeing high levels of interest, thanks in part to its announced Loyalty Bonus promotion,” Kbb.com pointed out.

“Oddly enough, of all the vehicles in Volvo’s lineup, the two drawing the bulk of the attention on Kbb.com are the long-in-the-tooth yet popular XC90 SUV and the brand-new redesigned S60 sports sedan,” the site continued.

Rounding out the top five of all models with the greatest shopping activity growth were the Lincoln MKS (up 23.6 percent) and the Ford F-150 Supercrew Cab (up 22.6 percent).

Sliding in the opposite direction were two vehicles Kbb.com said have dropped by more than 20 percent. Sustaining the greatest declines in shopping activity were the Honda CR-Z (down 21.1 percent) and the Suzuki Kazashi (down 20.1 percent).

The other three vehicles mentioned in the report with significant negative shopping activity movements were the Volvo S40 (down 17.6 percent), the Chevrolet Silverado 1500 Extended Cab (down 16.2 percent) and the Chevrolet Cobalt (down 16.1 percent).

Turning back to just newly introduced or redesigned models, three vehicles that Kbb.com discovered to have gains in shopper activity included the 2011 Scion tC (up 8.4 percent), the 2011 Chevrolet Cruze (up 8.0 percent) and the 2011 Mitsubishi Outlander Sport (up 7.7 percent).

The performance of the Mitsubishi unit particularly caught Kbb.com’s attention.

“Since Mitsubishi is not in the position to launch its new Outlander Sport with a high-budget marketing program, creative minds have found a way to use the Internet and remote-control robots to give Web shoppers an advance ‘test drive’ with the exciting LiveDrive program,” site analysts noticed.

Wrapping up the latest Hot Cars Report were a trio of newly introduced or redesigned models that have slipped a bit. While the 2011 Honda Odyssey edged marginally lower by just 0.1 percent, Kbb.com indicated the 2011 Nissan Juke dropped 7.0 percent and the 2011 Volkswagen Jetta dipped 9.1 percent.