[staff]

GM optimistic about Cruze premiere

General Motors Co. will get small-car serious at the Los Angeles Auto Show when it takes the wraps off the 2011 Chevrolet Cruze.

The Cruze, which will arrive in the third quarter of next year as the replacement for the Chevy Cobalt, will feature small, efficient engines and a six-speed transmission that will help it achieve up to 40 mpg on the highway. It could have a range of up to 600 miles.

The five-passenger Cruze debuted in Europe and Asia this year. GM will build the U.S. Cruze in Lordstown, Ohio.

"The amenities, quietness and roominess you expect in larger cars are what the Cruze delivers," said Margaret Brooks, Chevrolet product marketing manager. "This is a car that will shake up the compact segment, with a more spacious interior and more cargo room than the Honda Civic and Toyota Corolla."

It will need to do a lot of shaking to take on the foreign carmakers, which own 78.1 percent of the U.S. small car market.

While small cars sales have dropped 23.4 percent this year during a catastrophic sales year, GM's Cobalt has seen sales plummet 46.2 percent through October, according to AutoData Corp.

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