We weren't all that surprised to learn this bit of news and we doubt many people will shed any tears. According to Car and Driver, the Volkswagen GTI two-door hot hatch is dead, at least in the US. During a VW launch event, C&D was told by the automaker's US marketing chief, Hendrik Muth, "the trend is clearly shifting toward four-door models." Remember, the Golf R is four-door only and the standard two-door Golf is already a goner. So what's the appeal of a two-door GTI? It cost around $600 less.

It doesn't offer the same amount of interior space and utility as the four-door and Americans, well, they like to have a lot of readily available space for Costco runs and such. C&D also seems to think the six-speed manual transmission is safe (for now) in the GTI. 2017 will also see VW adding more features to the GTI, though we still don't have official pricing as of this writing. Will anyone miss the two-door GTI? Few if any. VW is also looking everywhere it can these days to reduce costs in the wake of Dieselgate, a criminal act that's costing the company plenty. But the GTI, just not the two-door, is safe from the chopping block.