2013 Fiat 500 Turbo Revealed

I disagree with speed increases...at least in RI only one highway has a 65mph speed limit with a majority of the rest at 50-55. 20 minutes of my commute is on rt 138 which is a highway with speeds easily matching 65 however because of the lovely folks of jamestown, the highway is limited to 45/40 with heavy police monitoring. Its always fun in my focus to overtake grandpa in the left lane doing 25 only to worry about the statey around the corner. my cars have progressed in the 0-60 department but still sluggish so I cannot relate to the 5 seconds....my Fiero was 14 seconds, Jeep 9, and Focus 8. As for the point of this Fiat it seems like it is geared for someone my age. Insurance companies love to gouge in RI as we are ranked as one of the highest accidents per capita. Cars like the abarth are ranked as sport hatches and when I was quoted, were averaging 650.00 a month for full coverage. Meanwhile a cruze turbo was around 398.00. When VW offered the 2.0T in the regular Jetta as well as the GLI I was quoted a 180.00 difference for virtually the same car. But of course YMMV

The Versa sedan is the Chevette of today... Does the 500 Turb have the glass roof? Pic above looks iffy on it. I'd rather take a more practical Dart over a 500 (whatever level) and likely little difference in mileage.

This model should have been available at the time of Fiat's launch in the US. Mini was smart enough to launch with the base 115 hp Cooper and the "hot" 170 hp Cooper S back in 2001.

Intrigued by the new "T." I guess I would have prefered the lineup to be "Sport/Turbo/Lounge/Abarth," but it is what it is. They could sink the Pop by about $1500 and make it a real price/value proposition, but don't see that happening. As for the "need for speed" arguement...I've had that one ad nauseum with my FIL (who owns a last-year-made Firebird Firehawk) and swears that you need 350+ HP just to survive the open road. Given today's road congestion and traffic patterns, I've been rather content (and safe) with cars bringing much less firepower to the table, so to speak. I actually enjoyed driving my 2000 VW Golf more at the time (until just about every electronic piece of equipment started to grenade exactly 2 days after the warranty expired...but that's way off topic). Test driving the Sport with a manual a few months ago, I was pleasantly surprised at my ability to keep up in the types of traffic I'm subjected to every day. So yes...I'm sure that the Camry sitting next to me at the stop light will be able to out accelerate me...to the next stop light. Not sure what that gains him. Bragging rights? Guess I'm the oddball out in that I kind of like small, lightweight (relatively speaking in today's terms) and manual transmission cars that I can toss around a little and work to drive and enjoy. Seriously will be considered a 500 when my deployment is over. Might make it a "T in Rame!