Hello from The Netherlands
 

Hi guys!

I'm a student from The Netherlands without a licence as of now, but plan on buying a 1999-2002 Corolla liftback this year.

I'm already delving into the Ecomodder forums to learn about fuel saving mods, considering I'll have to drive to school soon and want to go on some low budget mountainbike holidays. Looking forward to spending time here learning and submitting content once I get myself a Corolla.

Cheers,

HC

Hi and welcome. One of the mods will be along shortly to give you a more official welcome than mine.

Forgive me if I'm misrecalling, but isn't the Netherlands really bicycle friendly? I'm not trying to pee on your plans, just saying that if that is the case, it would have to be one long commute before I looked at getting a car.

I used to commute about five miles each way and by bike it was nothing, maybe a half-hour ride. Much longer than that, or hot or very cold weather and the car wins, but otherwise...

I'm not familiar at all with any Euro-specific specifications on the Corolla. In fact some models branded Corolla in Europe aren't even what we get in the States as Corollas - different cars.

Welcome to the site! Make sure to check out the hypermiling tips and ecomods list up top.

The Netherlands is very bicycle friendly. Currently public transport is free for me as a student, but nevertheless I do the commute by bike around twice a week, it's a 35 mile round trip though. I'll have to pay for transport myself in around two years though, so I hope to combine commuting by bike every dry day and taking the car every wet day. I genuinly enjoy the ride so an electric bike would be unnecessary.

The Corolla's we have come with the same engines, although you guys get the larger 1.8 ZZ engine compared to our 1.6. No worries though, the majority of the commute would be at a steady state of around 80km/h :turtle:

An older E100 Corolla or an early Honda Fit are two other serious contenders though, its just that the aero of the liftback E110 seems slightly better, and the Honda Fit is slightly more expensive used (it would take more mileage to be able to justify the price difference). We also have a lot of Suzuki Swifts (Geo Metro's) but I'd like to take my bike in the trunk with me :p

35 miles round trip, dang. Okay, THAT's definitely car ride territory. My own commute is about 45 miles round trip, and it's sharing the mountainous roads with Tennessee drivers. This is about as bicycle-unfriendly as it gets, occasional bike lanes notwithstanding.

If you can cruise at a steady 80 km/h, you're in for some truly huge numbers. That's a nice, easy pace for pretty much everything bigger than a moped.

Corolla liftbacks are a rare sight in the Netherlands.

The VW Lupo 3L might be a good choice or a Citroën AX diesel.

Or an electric moped, depending if you can charge at work.

I haven't seen a Corolla liftback from that period for more than a decade.