Trans-Siberian Railway 2013: Krasnoyarsk, Siberia Photo Report

The Toyota Ist is by far the most popular used Japanese import in Krasnoyarsk.

This is Part 7 of my Trans-Siberian Photo Report. You can see all other Parts of this long-term Photo Report here. We are now moving 450km East to Krasnoyarsk in the midst of Siberia. And this is it: used right-hand drive Japanese imports have taken over. Although I only stayed in Krasnoyarsk 4 hours it is enough to establish the simple fact that roughly every second car in the city is a used Japanese import, therefore being driven with the steering wheel on the wrong side!

Zhiguli in front of the Krasnoyarsk Vokzal

Zhiguli x3

And king of them all is the Toyota Ist, which is fighting with the Lada Zhiguli for the title of most frequent model in the streets of Krasnoyarsk. Yep, that many. The Ist success as a used vehicle in Russia is all the more impressive that its popularity was short-lived in Japan: it ranked #4 for its first year in market there in 2002, #6 in 2003, #8 in 2004 to then disappear from the Top 20 ever since…

Honda Airwave

Toyota Grand Hiace

Mitsubishi eK and Toyota bB

Among the ever-expanding variety of Japanese imports I can see in circulation the further East I go, I saw a few current generation Honda Stepwagon and Airwave, Odyssey, Nissan Cube, Serena, Presage, Toyota Wish, Opa, Caldina, Corolla Axio, Voxy, Allion and even one IQ, one Mazda Verisa and one Mitsubishi Airtrek. I even picked one more Toyota Will Cypha! I have to say I will never tire of being astonished at how popular this model is in Russia.

Hyundai Elantra and Hond Pilot

The Lada Granta, although very well established, may not be the best-selling new model in Krasnoyarsk, that honour could well go to the Hyundai Solaris, once again extremely solid and consistent in every single city I visited since my arrival in Russia 10 days ago. Other very successful new cars here are the Kia Rio, Ford Focus, VW Polo, Hyundai Elantra, Renault Logan and Toyota Camry in this order.

Toyota RAV4

Hyundai Santa Fe and Japanese spec Toyota Corolla

SUVs are here in force, especially the new generation Toyota RAV4 and Hyundai Santa Fe, both already impressively frequent in the streets of Krasnoyarsk, with the Toyota Prado, Kia Sportage, Hyundai ix35 and Mazda CX-5 also over-represented.

New generation Toyota Corolla and RAV4

As far as recent launches are concerned, I spotted two new generation Toyota Corolla in the space of a couple of hours which to me is quite amazing, one new Lexus IS, one Mercedes CLA and one new Skoda Octavia.

Daewoo Nexia and Infiniti QX56

Popular luxury models include the new gen Mercedes E-Class, GL-Class and M-Class and Infiniti QX56, while in the Chinese aisle the same two familiar SUVs stand out: the Lifan X60 and Great Wall Hover, each spotted a few times in the streets of Krasnoyarsk.

That was the Krasnoyarsk car landscape for you! I hope this was exotic enough, next stop is Irkutsk near the Lake Baikal…

Full Photo Report and estimated Top 10 models ranking below.

Krasnoyarsk September 2013 – rough estimate:

Hyundai Solaris

Go! Kia Rio

Hyundai i30

Toyota Prado

Mitsubishi Outlander

Toyota Ist

Hyundai Santa Fe and Mitsubishi ASX

Toyota Opa

Ford Focus