This Dope-Ass Volkswagen Van Is Like A GTI You Can Tow Another GTI With

It feels like we’re suffering from a deficiency in vitamin V. Remember when vans used to be cool? Murals, stripes, a little bit of modification, putting a twist on a deeply pragmatic form factor. While the van market in North America largely continues to dwindle with small vans going extinct and GM cancelling the BrightDrop, Europe is still going hard. This is the Volkswagen Transporter Sportline, and it almost looks like an oversized GTI.

The changes start up front, with a red-striped grille. There’s just something right about a red stripe on the grille of a sporty Volkswagen, partly because it goes all the way back to the original Golf GTI. Forget smearing heritage on with a trowel, a little pinstripe will do the trick. Of course, that dash of red alone would look awkward on the front of an otherwise standard van, so the Transporter Sportline has been punched up a bit with a new color-keyed front bumper that incorporates a Mk8 GTI-like dogbone lower faux-grille. No hexagonal accent lights, sadly, but this van still looks tuff as, bro.

Moving along the side of the Transporter Sportline, the big-ticket item here is a set of 19-inch six-spoke wheels that fill out the arches reasonably well. Of course, the side skirts and blacked-out mirror caps are blink-and-you’ll-miss-it stuff, but sometimes subtlety is a virtue. Besides, you wouldn’t want to accidentally step on your park bench-sized side skirts when unloading something through the sliding door, right?

I won’t lie, the rear three-quarter view might be this van’s best angle. The almost JGTC-like sculpting of the rear bumper, the moderately whimsical dual-element rear spoiler, there’s just something slightly mischievous about it without going all the way over the top. You know, like some of the Ford Transit MS-RTs.

Does the Sportline treatment make the Volkswagen Transporter any faster? No, not really. It still offers the same sort of standard diesel power as other models, but you do get Eibach lowering springs that drop the ride height by 1.14 inches. Not exactly an enormous change, but it ought to help. If that’s a minor disappointment, sport seats, a heated steering wheel, and a big center console on Kombi models ought to cheer you up at least a touch.

The Volkswagen Transporter Sportline might not be a crazy sleeper, but I’m still sad that it won’t make the trip across the Atlantic. Visually, it’s like a GTI that can tow another GTI, and matching the tow vehicle with, say, a race car is cool full-stop. So, let’s call this another machine to put on our 25-year list. Hey Ford, Stellantis? Any chance we could get street van versions of the full-size Transit and Promaster?

Top graphic image: Volkswagen