New Vauxhall Corsavan 1.3 CTDi review: city-slicker that’s a fuel-sipper

IF you want to buy a car-derived van nowadays, on the assumption that you need a commercial vehicle but don’t really want to be seen driving one, the choices are limited in the extreme.

Let’s see, there’s the Ford Fiestavan, the Vauxhall Corsavan and, er, that’s about it, unless you include the Fiat Puntovan (which we haven’t seen around for a while now).

So what happened to all those old car-derived favourites of the past? The Citroen Nemo, Fiat Fiorino and Peugeot Bipper arrived, that’s what. Back in 2008 this trio (basically the same van with different badges) burst on to the city van scene, offering more than twice as much loadspace in the back and a tougher build quality.

Seven years down the line and only Ford and Vauxhall are left to battle it out for a share of the car-derived tiny end of the market.

Seven years down the line and only Ford and Vauxhall are left to battle it out for a share of the car-derived tiny end of the market.

Now while it is true that the Fiestavan and Corsavan don’t hold as much cargo, they make up for that loss well and truly in the ride, handling and standard specification departments and we’ll be examining this later in the article.

As things stand at present, the existing Corsavan sold 2,400 units last year and the Fiestavan sold close on double that. So with the launch of a brand new Corsavan this month (April) Vauxhall will be looking to close the gap.

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