#CompactMPVs

Mitsubishi announced that it would be bringing a new concept vehicle to next month’s Tokyo Auto Salon and it’s… certainly something. Based on the upscale “Urban Gear” variant of the new Delica D:5, the show car aims to take Japanese van life offroad by bestowing the MPV with protective scaffolding, a roof rack, more lamps, and some red mudflaps.

Though, with three tiers of forward illumination (four if you count the roof) and one of the boxiest designs we’ve seen since the Volvo 240, the Delica looks like something straight out of an 1980s sci-fi film. Our own Steph Willems even went so far as to claim a rather uncanny resemblance to the titular hero from the film Robocop when presented with the above photo.

Two years after reporting on its U.S. death, TTAC can now report the Mazda5 will live on in current form for at least another model year in Canada.

The 2017 Mazda5 is not yet featured on Mazda’s Canadian media site, but when asked by TTAC last week whether the one true remaining North American “mini”van would hold its place in Mazda Canada’s lineup, we received an affirmative response.

“We are continuing to offer the Mazda5 here in the Canadian market,” Mazda Canada’s director of public relations, Sandra Lemaitre, told us via email last Friday. “The 2017 model year Mazda5 began production in July, so it should be in dealer showrooms shortly. It will be a carryover product with no major changes.”

This is news that will excite seven Canadians, and perhaps nine Americans who are considering crossing the border for a USD-equivalent $18,555 manual-transmission mini-MPV.

GM Canada sold only 32 copies of its Chevrolet Orlando in November 2014, the worst month yet for the rapidly declining Mazda 5 alternative.

Although the Orlando set an impressive sales pace in its first 18 months in Canada – 2612 were sold during 2012’s fourth-quarter – it’s been in free fall ever since. Sales have declined in 19 of the last 22 months. 2013 volume was down 68%. Through eleven months, Orlando volume in 2014 is off by 43%.

The Astonization of Ford continues, this time with the newly revised 2015 C-Max, bowing at the 2014 Paris Auto Show.