Two More (Efficient) Cars You Can’t Have

Yep, run these two side-by-side and see which you’d rather drive.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=SIeu7_-iwdw#!
Top Gear – car football – Volkswagen Fox vs. Aygo – BBC
http://www.topgear.com/uk/videos/ouch-my-neck
Jeremy drives the Nissan GT-R (series 11, episode 5)
“They haven’t built a new car here; they’ve built a new yardstick.”

My offer is still open.

Did they stop selling the Yaris here? I know it was available for a few years, at least. Didn’t get very good reviews, as I recall, with the Honda Fit looking like a better choice in the same basic category.

@IanJ:

Yeah, I’m seeing the Yaris on Toyota’s website.

@IanJ: Forgot they finally started to sell it here – my bad, confused w/ this car (which is now available as a Scion (yet another Toyota brand), I think?)

Yeah, the iQ is available from Scion. I was talking with some friends who know cars far better than I do, and they didn’t really have anything good to say about the iQ — claiming it was not very efficient, not very innovative, and ridiculously expensive for what you get. Interesting accusations, although I haven’t done any research of my own. No matter, I’m not about to buy an small, efficient cars, I already have a 55 MPG motorcycle that I can take to 70 MPG with careful riding.

@blogenfreude: I am an idiot- the car they’re using is a Toyota Aygo, which is not available here.

@blogenfreude: FWIW, my wife had a Yaris when we lived in Central America eight years back, and loved it. In CONUS, I think it was initially marketed as the Matrix or something like that, because we were surprised to see them under a different name when we returned in ’06.

@Beggars Biscuit: Toyotas, in general, are indestructible. I dumped my ’87 4×4 pickup on its side in a snowstorm in 1989, and a couple rednecks helped me shove it back onto its wheels. Drove it home and, 1300 bucks worth of bodywork later it was good as new. Top Gear trying to destroy a HiLux (Toyota pickup in British) a decade or so later proves my point.

@blogenfreude: The HiLux was the vehicle of choice for humanitarian field work in the early 90s. Weren’t they also conveniently repurposed by Somali gangs as “technicals”?

You can always count on finding a local mom ‘n pop repair place in the developing world for either Toyota parts or at least the know-how to keep the thing bandaged and running.

@blogenfreude: My 1992 Toyota MR2 agrees.