Honda Brio: Spacious, powerful and brilliant for city use

Mumbai: Hot on the heels of launching the new, face-lifted Jazz and revising the prices of the City, Honda let a few, including yours truly, test drive its new small car, the Brio, in Vishakapatnam. After being briefed about the car and its features, we set out on a coastal route to check out what it feels like. Or at least we tried to.

Halfway through the set route, there was road that was probably only a few kilometres long but had no traffic and consisted of smooth stretch and switchbacks every few metres. What better place to test a car, and test I did the little fella, up and down that road at least fifty times to see what it’s made of.

Exterior
The first thing you notice head-on is Brio’s strong resemblance to the Jazz. And for what is a small car, it doesn’t look much smaller, which is a very good thing. Move to the side and there’s a window line that gradually moves up, but not so much to make the rear seat passengers feel like prisoners. At the rear, you’re greeted with protruding tail lights and an all-glass tailgate. Rearward visibility is excellent because of this, but the flipside is, one careless reverse shift or someone failing to brake in time could mean the whole backside is gone. Granted there won’t be shards flying through the cabin because of laminated glass, but replacing will be costly, especially considering that insurance will only cover 50% of the cost. Nevertheless, the car looks good, even fantastic in brighter colours as light accentuates the creases.