2007 Toyota 4runner Limited Sport Utility 4-door 4.0l Sport Edition on 2040-cars

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Pickup sales may hit 2M units for first time since 2007

Even as fuel prices creep back up, trucks are still a hot item among new-vehicle shoppers. To see how popular pickup trucks still are, you don't have to look any further than how much effort automakers put into the continual one-upmanship of their trucks. Backing this fact up, USA Today is reporting that the segment could top two million sales this year - a total not matched since 2007, though still far from the pre-recession, three-million-unit levels.
Through August, the Ford F-Series continues to be the segment leader with almost 500,000 units sold, but the Chevy Silverado (328,269), Ram 1500 (234,642), GMC Sierra (122,232) and Toyota Tacoma (110,293) are all seeing at least 20-percent sales increases, helping to account for around 1.44 million truck sales so far this year - not including possible outliers like the Suzuki Equator and Chevy Avalanche.
This year alone, General Motors has completely redesigned its fullsize trucks, Ram and Toyota have significantly updated their offerings, the next-gen Ford F-150 will be out next year and Nissan is promising an all-new Titan around the same time with an eventual Cummins diesel under the hood. It would seem, then, that truck sales are poised to continue their upward trend.

A new Toyota MR2? We want to believe

In the wake of a busy Geneva auto show, the rumor mill is churning, and the latest grist involves one of the most beloved Toyota sports cars of all time. EVO reports that Tetsuya Tada, the chief of the Scion FR-S/Toyota 86 project and a hard-liner about sportscar priorities (light and nimble, but with modest horsepower), wants a third vehicle for Toyota's nascent sporty lineup. Currently, we know there's a Supra-like vehicle in the works, being co-developed with BMW, and the 86 is sticking around. Tada said he'd like a third sportscar to compliment the two we know about, and that he wants it soon. A quick bit of history: Toyota's classic sporty lineup had three components. The most visible was the Supra, whose power and prestige grew as the car evolved from a cushy personal tourer to a high-horsepower, high-technology icon. The Celica was its Clark Kent, more mild mannered but also more accessible and affordable. The third was the MR2, a mid-engined go-kart that lasted for three distinct generations. Each had its charms, and all have their fans. When Tada says that he wants three sportscars in the lineup, we already know about the Supra successor, and the 86 is already filling the Celica's role, so the blank is easy to fill. It doesn't sound like Tada spoke the word "MR2" to EVO, or hinted that the car would be mid-engined, but Tada doesn't seem to say anything without purpose. Whatever the layout, this third car – if it comes to fruition – will probably play a role similar to the MR2 in relation to its stablemates. To translate: it'll likely be even lighter and more nimble, and probably less powerful, than the 86. The closest real-world analogue to the pure MR2 ideal is the Honda S660, a mid-engined Kei roadster that's on sale in Japan right now. It's light, small, and powered by a 0.66-liter inline-three. Toyota could decide to directly compete with the S660, borrow an engine from its small-car specialist subsidiary Daihatsu, and produce a mid-engined MR2. Another possibility, even simpler from Toyota's perspective, would be to adapt the existing Daihatsu Copen roadster. Sure, it's front-engine and front-wheel drive, but it's a small, light roadster. And even better, it sells abroad with a larger 1.3-liter engine. Restyle it slightly, perhaps to resemble the S-FR concept of a couple years ago, and it's an off-the-shelf solution. The S-FR itself is a third possibility.

Scion rules out roadster, turbo versions of FR-S

Ever since Toyota and Subaru released the sports car alternatively known as the GT86, 86, BRZ and Scion FR-S a couple of years ago, rumors have circulated that even more exciting variants could be in store. But at least as far as Scion is concerned, those rumors are apparently nothing more than wishful thinking. Speaking with WardsAuto at the LA Auto Show last week, Scion chief Doug Murtha said that the prospect of an FR-S roadster has been taken off the table entirely. Apparently Scion lobbied parent company Toyota to produce just such a model, but after failing to find other markets interested enough in the model to put it into production, corporate HQ said no. "I think we were pretty aggressive on our (submitted plan), but we looked at what we would have conceivably lost on the product and said, 'We're not going to even push it further,'" Murtha said, going on to note, "Nobody was more disappointed than we were." Murtha further shot down the idea of a turbo version of the FR-S, dismissing it as a prospect the blogosphere (that's us) wanted to happen but "that's not something that's coming." Either variant might have helped Scion and Toyota boost sales of the model (which are predictably dropping after their first two years on the market), but the investment also might not have paid off their development, tooling and marketing costs. Of course, Murtha can only speak for Toyota, but we'd be surprised to see Subaru go it alone on either model, as costs would be that much more prohibitive without a partner. Bummer.