Zoomer Consumer: VW GLI

– Can it make the morning commute more fun?

Stop. Go. Stop. Go. Bicyclist! Weave. Stopped bus! Weave again. Pedestrian! Stop.

Aside from rare mornings when red lights, public transportation and those wobbly bicyclists cease to exist, the above sequence typifies my daily commute to work. A simple five-minute drive can easily triple and leave me baffled – I thought I moved to the city to avoid those long commutes?

(I know you may be thinking, “Five minutes? 10 minutes? 15?! I would take that morning drive over my suburb-to-city parking lot highway any day.” I agree – my trip is shorter than most urban workers. But it’s the principal – I’m already in the city, it shouldn’t take that long!).

Some days I can shave off a few minutes with a lead foot, alternate routes and sheer luck – but that just takes more forethought than I’m usually capable of pre-noon time.

Enter the Volkswagen GLI. Starting at $29,975, the 2009 GLI, which dropped the Jetta tag last year, acts as an ideal bridge between eco-compact sedans and high-end models – and proved to be the perfect city vehicle.

VW’s superb DSG (Direct-Shift Gearbox) auto-manual transmission made this an ease, and absolute joy, to drive. The dual-clutch system (which exists without a physical clutch pedal) automatically shifts through the gears so seamlessly; it made accelerating around sticky city situations an instantaneous motion. Instead of hearing the engine rev high and loud before finally switching gears, the DSG turned that into a split-second thought. I heard the gears change, but didn’t feel a thing. Combine that with the 2.0L, turbocharged engine pushing out 200 HP and this turns into a powerful vehicle that can gallop through most situations – and in hurry.

The exterior styling could use more pizzazz, especially for such a sporty drive. But at its price point, the GLI is the surest bet for a sport sedan when stacked up against the Acura TSX, (the cheaper and very nice) Honda Civic Si and Subaru Legacy GT.

–Travis Persaud