Detroit 2010: Volkswagen New Coupe Concept

It's been a long time since VW marketed a Jetta coupe. There's been a smattering of VW 2-doors (Scirocco, Corrado) and a whole bunch of hatches, but there hasn't been a 2-door 4-seat coupe in the lineup since the 80's (since you can't actually count the Corrado's rear seats.  C'mon.)  And despite the current (and gorgeous) Scirroco being on sale in Europe, VW decided that the US market needs something else with two doors so as not to cannibalize GTI sales.  Which are pretty strong.

This is the New Coupe Concept, but you can just called it Jetta Coupe.  It sits on a modified MKVI Golf chassis: 3" longer wheelbase (probably to fit all those blasted batteries) and 2" shorter roofline, but it doesn't look like a long-legged Golf, it looks more like a Junior A5.  The styling isn't what you'd call adventurous, with a bit of Scion tC to the side profile and the generic MKVI face.

What's more relevant is the powertrain.  As you can tell from the prominent Hybrid badges, it's got some batteries and an electric motor.  The basic gas engine is the 1.4 TSI twin-charged I4, supercharged and turbocharged to 150bhp.  There's also a 20kW electric motor fed off a lithium-ion battery pack.  Total combined output is 177bhp and an equal amount of torque, which seems sufficient.  This dynamic duo is hooked up to a 7-speed twin-clutch DSG transmission for maximum efficiency.

VW says the Jetta Coupe - sorry, New Coupe Concept - will average 45 US MPG, and also be able to move to 60mph in 8.1 seconds from a standstill.  That's not too shabby, but I'd like to point out that a current Jetta 2.0 TDI posts about the same mileage and performance numbers with only 140bhp and way less complication.  The emissions question looms heavy here, obviously, but I think I'd rather pump from the stinky pump and change my fuel filter every 30k miles, rather than worry about a turbocharger and a supercharger and some batteries and an electric motor and a DSG gearbox.  That's just me.

Still, questionable hybrid bits aside, the NCC is an attractive car that VW could probably sell a ton of here, to people who normally buy boring things like Accord or Altima Coupes.  Quite why we still can't have the Scirocco is beyond me, but this seems like a suitable substitute for this market.