Geneva Motor Show - The Peugeot 308 has been named European Car of the Year by a jury of 58 motoring journalists on the eve of the Geneva Motor show. When all the adding up was done the 308 had scored 307 points (including top points from 22 of the jurors), way ahead of the next two nominees, both of which were electric cars.
The second-placed BMW i3 wound up with 223 points, with the Tesla S close behind on 216.
The rest of the seven nominees were the Citroen C4 Picasso, which collected 182 points, the Mazda3 (180), Skoda Octavia (172) and Mercedes S-Class (170).
The jury said the 308 “exudes quality and elegance”.
This is the first time the award has gone to a 308, unlike Renault, which has won twice with difference generations of the Clio, and Volkswagen, which took the honours for the second time in 2013 with the Golf - although Peugeot won it in 2002 with the 307, the direct ancestor of this year's winner.
Built on Peugeot's new EMP2 platform, the 308 comes in five-door hatch or SW estate format, with a choice three 1.2-litre three-cylinder engines (a 60kW naturally-aspirated and two turbocharged versions of 80kW and 95kW respectively) and four turbodiesels, all the same size but with different outputs ranging up to 132kW.