Yaris on a high
Usually when a company takes one of its normal hatchbacks and gives it the faux off-road treatment it simply sticks on some grey plastic cladding around the wheel arches, fakes up a protective plate under the front bumper and sticks on a suitably tempting badge.
Ford went for Active, and does anyone remember the Rover Streetwise? It was a dolled-up 200 that actually started this trend.
A neighbour of mine asked me to let him know when I had the new Toyota Yaris Cross on test because he thought it might be perfect for his elderly parents. Happy to help, but I couldn’t quite see where he was coming from. A Yaris with bits stuck to it? That’s hardly the thing for the senior motorist, is it?
But having spent a week in the car I can now see exactly why he’s thinking about it. For starters, it’s far more than a Yaris that’s been attacked with glue and Velcro.
It’s got the same wheelbase as the parent car but otherwise it’s very different. The styling, for example, has been strongly influenced by the RAV-4 (as owned by the neighbour in question, so it’s all falling into place) and overall it’s rather an attractive looking machine.
But what has caught the attention of my friend down the road is a very generous ride height that is 25mm higher than on a standard Yaris. He’s not thinking about the benefit to his parents if they go off-roading but of how much easier it will be for them to get into the car. A very good point.
Once inside they’ll see the usual high-quality Toyota interior. Plenty of plastic and not a huge amount of flair, but as anyone who has been in the back of an Uber driver’s been-tomars-and-back Prius will know, Toyota builds car interiors that don’t rattle or squeak.
There is no choice to be made when it comes to engines. All Yaris
Crosses come with a 1.5-litre petrol unit and all of them are part of a hybrid powertrain.
Unusually, and almost unique in the world of compact crossovers, the car is also available with four-wheel drive. I would imagine sales of this variant will be quite low.
Overall though, Toyota reckons the Yaris Cross might become the company’s best-selling model in the UK after the Yaris itself.
An average fuel economy of 56.5mpg is claimed and that’s exactly what we managed. How you drive and where you drive a hybrid makes an enormous difference to the fuel economy that you are likely to get from it.
Motorways are bad, towns are good, and thrashing along country roads is not ideal. I did a fair bit of motorway miles in the car so more town use would have dramatically improved the figure. Not least because around town you will hear the Yaris Cross regularly making its way silently under electric power.
It’s much nicer than when you drive it fast with the petrol engine because the CVT automatic transmission sends the revs whooping up and down.
Our test car, in £26,495 Dynamic spec, wears 18-inch alloys. Sixteen or 17-inch wheels would probably make the ride more comfortable, but regardless, it’s not too harsh on the big wheels.
So overall, there’s not much to criticise on this soon-to-be-acommon-sight small Toyota.