Toyota announces new Verso, Auris SW

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Dim teaser shot of Auris Tourer shows long roofline that always makes estate version look more elegant than shorter siblings.

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Toyota will use the Paris motor show to take the wraps off a comprehensively renewed range of models for the European family and small-car market with the premieres of the new Auris hatchback, Auris Tourer and Verso people carrier

We've already covered the new Auris, which will be built only at Toyota's Burnaston plant in the UK and is due for SA release in the first quarter of 2013, but this dim teaser shot is the first picture we've seen of the new Auris Tourer - the first long-roof version to join the Auris range.

Toyota also says it will be the first C-segment estate to offer the choice of full hybrid power, as well as petrol and diesel engines, and it'll give the company a foothold in a segment that accounts for around 25 percent of European compact-car sales.

The Tourer's styling is very similar to the new Auris hatch - which makes a lot of sense from a production point of view, but will, of course, offer vastly bigger loadspace.

BIG INSIDE, SMALL OUTSIDE

Also playing the loadspace card is the new Verso, the third element in Toyota's new C-segment line-up - a significantly revised version of the compact people carrier that showcases the company's European design and engineering capabilities.

Hiding in the shadow of the Auris hybrid in this teaser shot, the taller, more spacious Verso is perhaps the most European of Toyota's C-segment models.

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The Verso uses Toyota's new design language, showing a clear family resemblance to the Auris/Yaris range, while the interior has also been upgraded, and it comes with (among others) a revised two-litre D-4D diesel engine for which Toyota promises stronger performance with lower CO2 emissions.

While Toyota SA says it has no plans to release the Auris Tourer on the South African market, the Verso is ‘under consideration’ for a local debut sometime in 2013.

Click here to read about the new Auris.