The small car with a big road presence I

DON’T quite understand, I confess, the current fashion for ever-larger vehicles.

It seems every manufacturer worth its salt is rolling out as many different varieties of SUV as it can at the moment, even if some of them are of the ‘mini’ or ‘midi’ variety.

This comes at a time when we could all do with a bit of downsizing.

Small cars take up less space, and use less energy. It’s not rocket science.

And so I love a small car, and as small cars go Toyota’s Yaris is up there with the best.

Our test car this week is the Bi-tone 1.5 Dual VVT-iE (there’s another thing I don’t know; why car-makers these days have such long, inexplicably dull names for the various models).

Anyway - dull name not withstanding, this is a fine city vehicle, that would be a more than decent ride on a long-haul motorway jaunt, too.

This new Yaris, the fourth incarnation of the supermini that started it all back in 1997, has received a face-lift that brings it much more into line with the rest of the Toyota offering. In particular, it’s adopted the ‘X’ styling at the front that marks out Toyota’s tiny Aygo.

Out on the road, it looks more like a shrunken Auris (the next size up in the Toyota line), and that’s no bad thing, even if it is a little lacking in imagination and adventure (which is what a car like the Yaris should be about).

Inside there’s been a bit of a revamp, too, with Toyota thankfully adopting the current trend for simplifying dashboards and removing buttons rather than adding them.

And the inside is a bit bigger than before. I was surprised by the boot, as well. You’re not going to be able to move house with it, but you’ll get more than you might think in the back.

Under the bonnet, our test model forgoes the offered hybrid option that is unusual in a car of this size, and sported an all-new 1.5-litre four-cylinder petrol engine, which is pretty nippy while still returning excellent fuel efficiency.

Toyota says it can do 58.9MPG combined, and 45.6MPG around town. Those figures more or less tally with what I found during my week in the driving seat.

The Bi-tone trim level offers the chance to personalise the car a bit, with different interior styles matching the available exterior choices, which are all set off with black accents.

Our £17,595 model had added Touch 2 Go satnav system, which took the on the road price up to £18, 245. The base model on the range, though, with its 1-litre engine, can be had for as little at £12,495.

The hybrid options are naturally more expensive - if you wanted the Bi-tone trim level we tested in a hybrid, you’d be starting at £19,845.

Cars of this size obviously have the formidable task of persuading someone who might otherwise be sizing up a Fiesta to look its way instead.

The Yaris can do that, I’m sure and it comes compete with Toyota’s sturdy reputation for reliability built right in.