[Ryephile]

I would be surprised if the car came with a spare tire at all. A tiny donut at best, perhaps run-flats [collective groans emanate throughout the forum], and ideally a tiny accessory compressor and little tire plug kit next to a minimal tool kit.

Taking the A/C out is not in the cards in this century. You need the drier for windshield de-humidification anywhere there is humidity and the temps dip below the dewpoint, which is most of the USA.

Removing acoustic treatment can only go so far before nobody wants to be in the car without earplugs, driver included. Toyota might have the man-hour resources to develop sheetmetal panels for optimzed acoustics with minimal or no treatment while still retaining strength and weight characteristics, but that's an extensive and expensive to develop physics modeling on top of many prototypes that also add significantly to cost. On a relatively inexpensive and low-volume car, that's asking a lot.

There's a saying that floats around racing circles to the effect of: "High-Performance, Low Cost, and Reliability; choose two." Personally I believe you can only really perfect one of those, as having two attributes means you're sacrificing both.