SKODA CITI GO UNVEILED
Skoda CITI GO apparent Sister car to VW up! gets Skoda administration cues and seats four, could be priced as low as £7,000
Is this the best-value Skoda ever? The cast has appear official pictures of its new entry-level archetypal – a Fiat 500-rivalling baby car, which is acceptable to amount as little as £7,000 if sales alpha in â?¨June next year. Â
Called the CitiGo, it is Skoda’s adaptation of the ablaze new VW up! (driven in Issue 1,182), and gets the aforementioned all-new front-wheel-drive platform, which offers lots of amplitude for four occupants. It’s aswell actual efficient, acknowledgment to a 1.0-litre three-cylinder petrol engine.
The CitiGo takes the clean, beautiful looks of the up! and â?¨adds Skoda’s ancestors face to â?¨the foreground end. In comes the â?¨latest estimation of the â?¨familiar grille, which is belted â?¨by ample headlights, forth â?¨with simpler bumpers.Â
At the rear, the CitiGo swaps the up!’s all-glass tailgate for a half-metal affair, and replaces its tail-lights with beneath baroque clusters that ape the attending of the Octavia. But while it’s not as â?¨dramatic, the bigger rear windows accomplish it a added ancestors affable proposition, and it’s still a handsome and actual able-bodied ample baby car.
And it’ll be a ample one, too. At 3.5m long, 1.6m advanced and 1.5m tall, the CitiGo is agnate in admeasurement â?¨to the Fiat 500. But acknowledgment to a able belvedere – which moves the engine as far advanced as â?¨possible – the wheelbase is â?¨2.4m long, acceptation it rivals â?¨the VW Polo for autogenous space.
Flexibility in the four-seater â?¨is additional by fold-flat rear seats, extending cossack amplitude from 251 litres to 951 litres. In comparison, the 500 offers 185 and 550 litres. Inside, the foreground seats affection chip headrests, while there are atypical touches such as a photo holder army on the centre console, and a acceptable bag angle on the alfresco of the glovebox.Â
Safety kit includes ancillary airbags and City Safety Drive – a able arrangement which automatically brakes the car at low speeds if it senses an approaching crash. A carriageable iPad-style device, which incorporates sat-nav and buzz functions, additional Bluetooth music streaming, is aswell available.
Power comes from an all-new 1.0-litre three-cylinder petrol engine with 59bhp or 74bhp. Acknowledgment to the admittance of stop-start, the CitiGo will acknowledgment 67mpg and afford 97g/km of CO2 in ‘Green Tec’ trim, authoritative it absolved from alley tax. Five-speed chiral and a consecutive auto â?¨gearbox are both available.
Sales will alpha in June 2012 in three-door form, â?¨with a five-door accession â?¨two to three months after. Following VW’s admission of the up! GT at the Frankfurt Motor Show, â?¨it’s accessible Skoda will barrage a hot vRS alternative â?¨of the CitiGo, too, but Skoda administration accept said that a Fabia Monte Carlo appearance corrective advancement is abundant added likely.
While there’s no official â?¨word on price, Skoda has accepted that it will allegation a lot beneath than VW does for the up!, which starts at about £8,000. Insiders accept hinted that the CitiGo ambit could bang off at £7,000, undercutting the up! by at atomic £1,000, and the Toyota Aygo and Ford Ka by as abundant as £1,500.
However Skoda accept that the capital antagonism in this articulation will be from the new Fiat Panda, which fabricated its admission at the Frankfurt Motor Show beforehand this month.
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