Honda hopes revamped Civic will boost already strong sales

I expect the Civic to sell quite well, especially since the Accord is getting quite expensive even for American buyers.

But now, that leaves a gap for a lower-cost four-door sedan (or saloon as its known in Europe) for the US market. And that is where the Honda City--already in production in Mexico for the Mexican market--could come to the US market.

Wouldn't it be great if Honda took the Fit/Life and shrunk it down to 3 doors from 5, and gave it the turbo 1.5L engine with a 6-speed manual? It would be a lot like the old Civic Si hatchbacks, which were great cars. All the Hondas sold in the U.S. now are mid-size. I'd love to see them bring back smaller cars.

As for the decrease in U.S. economy car sales due to low gas prices, that will pass, just as it always has. The prices will go back up, and the people who bought cars that are less fuel efficient will scream bloody murder about gas being too expensive. It happens every time.

Too bad Honda is not mating a stick to the turbo models, for the company makes excellent manual transmissions.

The reason why Honda is doing less manual transmission automobile nowadays for non-European markets is that it's actually easier for an automatic transmission equipped automobile to meet today's strict emission laws (especially the European Euro 6 and the American EPA Tier 2 Bin 5 certification). That's one reason why Porsche spent a lot of its own money developing the PDK dual-clutch automatic, since it made it easier to get a Porsche sports car to meet modern emission rules.