17 Nov 06
What the Auris is, without doubt, is a visually more interesting, well-honed successor to all those solid but unsexy Corollas of the past, a car specifically set up to challenge the Golf and, as it happens, the Peugeot 307.
We should also add that, commercially, the Auris has huge implications for Toyota in Europe. It'll be built in the UK at Toyota's Burnaston plant in Derbyshire and in Turkey, with a full year's production targeted to shift nearly 200K units.
While that won't frighten the Golf, Focus or Astra, all of which sold more than 400K last year, Auris is just one part of a gathering Toyota bandwagon that's building up steam across Europe. So, yes, expect to see lots and lots of them in the UK.
Full disclosure: while it's true that the Japan-spec cars we drove are not total mirror images of what'll be landing in the UK (first sales start in February 2007), many key bits do carry over. While the Japanese-speaking Auris doesn't get diesels or manual boxes, which the UK cars will do, the two cars are otherwise really not so far apart.
Parked out in Chiba under bright autumnal sunlight, the Auris, which was designed at Toyota's ED2 studio in the south of France, looks neat and contemporary, especially from the sides and back, if also a bit identikit. The bulbous front end, meant to portray a new identity for Toyota in Europe, lacks character and would hardly keep the likes of Giugiaro or Pininfarina awake at nights, however.
The cabin works though and, like the whole car, is set up to be less polarising that the zoomy Jetsons style of the Civic. The big talking point is that massive freestanding console between the front seats, which achieves three things. One, it's both interesting and different; two, it raises up the gearlever to what's claimed to be the perfect ergonomic height; and three, it leaves some useful space underneath for oddments, etc.
