CULT of the SUV

The gas-guzzling, road-hog, tailfin Caddy was once emblematic of the wealthy Texan. It’s gone now, but its spiritual successor, the equally prof-ligate-and-proud-of-it Suburban, also rolls over inconveniences like $ 1.11-a-gallon premium and “compact” parking spaces. The Suburban, the alpha-male of sport-utility vehicles, now roams Dallas in record numbers, threatening the conventional passenger car with extinction. And the reason the Suburban and its fellow sport-utes own the road says more about the drivers man the cars.

Although the mammoth Chevrolet Suburban has been Texas’ unofficial state car for more than a decade, the rest of the country is just now cottoning onto this sport-utility thing. (For once, Dallas beat both coasts in trend-setting.) Fifteen years ago. sport-utes were driven almost exclusively by hard-core Field and Stream types. As recently as 1990, they accounted for only one out of every 15 new vehicles sold in America. Last year, the number was one of seven. Before too long, it’ll probably be one of four. And why not? Kids love ’em. So do octogenarians. Doctors, rappers, construction workers, stay-at-home moms-just about everybody wants an SUV. Even the Pope’s got one.

SOMETHING FOR EVERYONE

While cars grow more and more alike, sport-utility vehicles-the niche-marketer’s dream-now come in more varieties than Heinz. You want big? Check out the elephantine Lincoln Navigator, which weighs three times as much as a Chevrolet Metro. Looking for something more petite? The Suzuki X-90 seats two-barely-in the goofiest-looking wheeled contraption this side of the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile. Price no object? The Range Rover lists for $64,500, and that doesn’t include an on-board navigation system featuring the voice of an unflappable English valet.

Operating on a budget? For the price of a single liberally optioned Range Rover, you could buy an Isuzu Amigo, a Kia Spoilage, a Mitsubishi Montera Sport, and a Nissan Pathfinder.

At the moment, there are no fewer than 43 models from 22 manufacturers to choose from, and that’s not all. Nineteen new nameplates are expected to hit the market by 2002 as Cadillac, BMW. Volkswagen, even Porsche-Porsche!- jump on the bandwagon. Manufacturers aren’t stupid. They know that sport-utes are much more profitable than passenger cars. Better still, SUVs are so popular that they virtually drive themselves out of showrooms with desperate shoppers chasing after them, checkbooks in hand.

What consumers see in sport-utility vehicles is harder to figure.

Safety? People love the idea of being cocooned within tons of sheet-metal, but sport-utes are better candidates than cars for accidents.

Sporty? Four-wheel drive and skid plates are great, but most of these leviathans never venture further off-road than a gravel driveway.

Utility? Well, there’s something to be said for the ability to tow a condo, but mini-vans and station wagons are just as good, if not better, at moving people.

Factor in higher purchase prices, higher gas costs, higher insurance premiums, and an obvious question comes to mind:

Why has the SUV phenomenon taken over Dallas-and America? The sport-utility boom has been so big, and so unexpected, that a veritable cottage industry has sprung up to explain it. There have been demographic analyses. There have been psychographic reports. Learned monographs. White papers. Some experts say all the hoopla’s about empowerment. Others say it all comes down to sex-gender, actually. (Although most SUVs exude a sense of testosterone run amok, women seem to be driving the market.) This much is beyond dispute: Sport-utes are fundamentally about image, both the face we show to the world and the lies we tell ourselves, and Dallas is an image-conscious city. Sport-utes are big. They’re strong. They’re hot. They’re hip. And so, we try to convince ourselves, are we.

In the end, sport-utility vehicles may be best defined by what they aren’t: They’re not bore-you-silly family sedans. They’re not lives-of-quiet-desperation station wagons. They’re not over-my-dead-body minivans. They’re not flaunt-it-while-you-got-it glitz-mobiles. They are. in effect, anti-automobiles. Which is pretty ironic, really, because the biggest trend in sport-utes these days is that they’re becoming more and more like passenger cars.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

THE MODERN CONESTOGA

Selecting one model as the proto-sport-ute is an exercise that-like determining how many angels can dance on the head of a pin-inspires endless debate without making much of a difference. Chevrolet likes to claim precedence with its 1935 Carryall. An even stronger case can be made for the Jeep Wagoneer, introduced in 1962. And during the 1970s, long before the term sport-utility vehicle had been coined, the Suburban was already a Lone Star phenomenon.

But most experts agree that the modem sport-ute era dates from the debut of the four-door Jeep Cherokee in 1984. The Cherokee was-and remains today, in remarkably similar form-an intrepid offroad rock hound. But with four doors and a user-friendly interior, it could also do double-duty as a family hauler. A single vehicle combining sport with utility? High concept doesn’t get much better than that.

The increasingly refined vehicles that followed moved the SUV beyond the hunter/fisherman/sur-vivalist fringe. Yet at the same time, the sport-ute’s inherent honesty appealed to people looking for an antidote to the wretched excesses of the age. The primitive Jeep Wrangler, a direct descendant of the robust 4×4 lionized during World War II, became a favored emblem of the see-and-be-seen set. Suzuki, sensing an opportunity to carve out a new niche, scored a monster hit of its own with an even smaller, even cruder Samurai. The minisports-ute-mute?- was bom.

But even as their popularity mushroomed, SUVs had a skeleton in the closet: They were trucks-trucks with leather seats, true, trucks with power this and power that, trucks with all the trappings (and often the price tag) of luxury cars, but trucks just the same. Cars tend to be built around a unibody-a body and frame in a single unit, which enhances structural rigidity while reducing noise, vibration, and harshness. Most of them also feature independent suspensions, which produce a softer, more compliant ride. But trucks consist of bodies on separate ladder-type frames, usually with a beam axle at the rear end and, sometimes, at the front. Picture a Conestoga wagon and you’ll have the general design concept.

Ford had a better idea. The biggest gripes about SUVs were that they drove like trucks and- women were especially chapped over this one-that they required a stepladder to climb into. Realizing that at least 95 percent of all sport-ute owners never do any hard-core off-roading, Ford created a new vehicle with less ground clearance, a suspension tuned for pavement, and a car-like driving position-all ideal for navigating the curbs at Highland Park Village. The Explorer, introduced in 1990, immediately became the best-selling sport-utility vehicle of all time. Even today, long after the bloom has faded, the Explorer remains the fifth-best-selling vehicle-of any kind-in the nation.

Two years later, Jeep raised the bar higher still with a Grand Cherokee built around a unibody. A few years after that, Toyota introduced the toy-like RAV4-wags call it a short-utility-with an independent suspension. Next came the Lexus RX 300 and Mercedes-Benz ML320, which broadened the market to include high-line, rugged-looking hybrids of station wagon and mini-van. Isuzu’s new and aptly named Vehicross further blurs the distinction between cars and trucks.

There is, it seems, a sport-ute for every taste. But is there a taste for every sport-ute?

There are two schools of thought about sport-utility vehicles-those who think they’re nothing but overpriced boxes for the image-conscious crowd, and those who claim they’re the best auto news in a long time. Proponents of Proposition A are offended by the bulk of these magnificent hulks. A few cases in point: The mid-size Dodge Durango, though brand-new and state of the art, gets a pitiful 13 miles a gallon around town. Suburbans tip the scales at close to three tons (6,000 pounds). Think about that for a minute. Then again, the AM General Hummer-the original Desert Stormer- weighs in at nearly 7,000 pounds. That’s not a “light truck1’; that’s an unincorporated town.

Lincoln goes so far as to bill its Navigator as an “urban assault vehicle,” and even though the company’s tongue is planted firmly against its corporate cheek, this is something of a Freudian slip. The sheer mass of most sport-utility vehicles, coupled with their elevated bumpers and lack of a front crumple zone, means that they’re death-often literally-to the passenger cars they meet in traffic accidents. In fact, one recent study found that the occupants of a car are 10 times more likely to die than the occupants of a sport-ute when two such vehicles collide.

Opportunists have seized upon this sobering statistic as a compelling reason to buy SUVs of their own. Nice try. But as Newton gives, Newton takes away. Which is to say that the same attribute that makes sport-utes so dangerous when an accident occurs-their battleship dimensions- makes them more likely to be involved in a wreck in the first place. Extra weight translates into longer stopping distances. Beam axles limit cornering power. A high center of gravity increases the chance of rollovers. (SUV occupants are 3.5 times more likely than passengers in cars to die in this type of incident.) And since drivers feel safer in sport-utes. they tend to drive more aggressively. What we’ve got here, therefore, is an accident waiting to happen.

So what’s the upside of sport-utility vehicles? Well, they cost more than cars. They’re more expensive to maintain. They suck down fuel at outrageous rates. They generate stratospheric insurance premiums. Are we having fun yet?

All of this inspires critics to claim that SUVs, ostensibly the most practical of vehicles, are actually nothing more than studies in spin control. In the less-is-more ’90s, high-powered executives can score just as much cachet with their SUVs as they could with the BMWs and Benzes of the booming ’80s. Unlike most extravagances, a sport-utility vehicle comes equipped with socially acceptable justification. It allows owners to have their cake and eat it, too.

At least, that’s the theory. And like most conspiracy theories, it makes sense in an addled, X-Files sort of way. Two million buyers a year can’t be completely wrong, can they? And honestly, how far will people go just to impress their neighbors and the ubiquitous Dallas valet?

The argument in favor of sport-utes starts with the proposition that they do things no other vehicles can do, and they go places no other vehicles can go. Station wagons can’t tow cabin-cruisers. Minivans aren’t designed to haul lumber. Pickup trucks can’t carry entire families. Granted, four-wheel drive isn’t as useful in Dallas as it is in, say, the Snow Belt. But it’s an absolute necessity if you intend to go off-roading in the Hill Country-or traverse equatorial Africa, for that matter.

BIG. BIGGER. BIGGEST.

Okay, so sport-utility vehicles aren’t all things to all people. But even if the hype-meisters have overstated the case, the fact remains that you can find an SUV to perform virtually any task under the sun. That’s why sales continue to skyrocket- not because more people want more of the same thing but because new SUVs are creating new niches, which entice new buyers to the market.

Passenger cars are a mature product. In terms of packaging, there’s virtually no room for innovation. We’ve got one-box, two-box, and three-box design. High-end. Low-end. Front-wheel drive. Rear-wheel drive. You name it, somebody has thought of it. These days, in fact, instead of pioneering new segments, automakers are killing off old ones.

Sports cars, for example, are dropping like flies. The sport coupe is all but extinct. Same for the traditional rear-wheel-drive American luxo-barge. The new breed of sexy roadsters has generated loads of publicity, but it’s barely a blip on the larger sales radar.

Sport-ute-dom is where the action is. With automakers still hoping to exploit new niches, designers are being encouraged to take chances with brave new concepts such as the neither-fish-nor-fowl Lexus RX 300, Honda CR-V. and Subaru Forester. This parade of fresh thinking will continue during the 1999 model year with the Suzuki Grand Vitara, a mini-ute with a big name; the Chevrolet Tracker, which clothes the Suzuki’s underpinnings in striking, original bodywork; the contrarian Isuzu Vehicross; the mid-market Land Rover Discovery; the Escalade, Cadillac’s version of the Yukon/Tahoe/Denali; and the first overhaul of the Jeep Grand Cherokee.

The growth of the market is something of a double-edged sword to consumers. More choices mean abetterchance of finding a model tailored to your needs, but they also make the search proportionately more difficult. In the end. your decision will probably be driven by price, performance, appearance, practicality, and a dollop of impulse- all the usual suspects. In getting started, you’d probably do best to limit yourself to one of four categories: Cute-utes, short-utes, sporty-utes, and port-utes.

THE LAND YACHT

Port-utes are the dreadnoughts requiring berths rather than parking spaces. The ubiquitous Chevrolet/GMC Suburban is the biggest of the big boys, and size remains its major selling point. If the Suburban smacks of overkill, try the Chevrolet Tahoe, GMC Yukon, GMC Denali, or Cadillac Escalade, all of which are merely gigantic rather than colossal.

Slotting in between the Suburban and Yukon are the Ford Expedition and Lincoln Navigator, which share the same mechanicals. The Ford products are newer than their GM rivals-translating into better ride quality-but styling, particularly of the gaudy Navigator, may offend more delicate sensibilities.

THE JOCK

Sporty-utes are the mid-sized vehicles that dominate the market. There are plenty of excellent Japanese imports to choose from, and Mercedes-Benz is selling ML320s as fast as they roll off the Alabama assembly line. But this segment is bounded by two conceptual poles. Though built on a pickup truck platform, the Ford Explorer is essentially the station wagon of denial-a people-mover with modest off-road pretensions. The Jeep Grand Cherokee, on the other hand, carries impeccable off-road credentials. If you can’t get there in this baby, you probably shouldn’t be going.

THE COMPROMISE

Short-utes are the stumpy hybrids with what seems to be the market’s greatest growth potential. The Vulcan mind-meld of SUV and station-wagon thinking made the Honda CR-V an immediate hit after its debut last year.

Next, Lexus went even further in the same direction with its RX 300, which married luxury appointments to the most car-like sport-utility vehicle ever built. Expect to see plenty more of the THE POCKET-SIZE

The cute-ute segment is the home of the market’s funky, spunky, entry-level vehicles. The perkiest of the bunch is THE POCKET-SIZE

The cute-ute segment is the home of the market’s funky, spunky, entry-level vehicles. The perkiest of the bunch is the precious Toyota RAV4, which is so nonthreatening that it seems incongruous to mention it in the same sentence as the Jeep Wrangler. Still, the Wrangler sports its own brand of sex appeal.

If nothing out there strikes your fancy, just wait a few minutes, and yet another new sport-ute should hit the market. Chances are it will be lower to the ground than most current SUVs, making for easier entry and exit. It will probably be built around a unibody and an independent suspension for a more carlike feel. It won’t be much more than an off-road poseur because, chances are, it won’t be leaving the pavement. But it will have plenty of room for kids and cargo. And eventually, some marketing genius will come up with a perfect name for this perfect vehicle: He’ll call it a . . . station wagon.

Oh, what the hell: We’ve already relived the ’50s. Why not relive the ’60s too, while we’re at it?

Suburban Myth

Everyone is cashing in on the SUV craze, but only one sport-utility has become an icon.

Dozens of pretenders to the throne have staked their claims during the ’90s. But 12 years after Texas Monthly anointed it “the national car of Texas.” the mighty Suburban remains the king of Dallas’ sport-utility hill. “We looked at other vehicles, but none of them did as much as the Suburban.” says Piano dentist Dr. Regina Powe. “You can eat in it. You can commute in it. You can travel in it. You can haul cargo in it. You can tow a boat with it, The only thing it can’t do is clean itself. If it cleaned itself. I’d sleep in it”

The Chevrolet/GMC Suburban is the most gargantuan noncommercial passenger vehicle built in the United States. Although it’s officially designated as a light truck, it’s actually an 18-foot-long whale that can just about swallow a Miata whole. Like many of the Dallasites who favor them, Suburbans are bold, colorful creatures with larger-than-life dimensions mid capabilities etched in urban myth.

A few cases in point: Thanks to its 42-gallon gas tank, a Suburban can make il from Dallas to El Paso without stopping. Not only does it seat nine-comfortably-but it can also accommodate all of their luggage. Legend has it that workers assembling Suburbans at a Chevrolet plant in Mexico used to bunk in them instead of going home at night.

At one point, two out of every five Suburbans were sold in Texas. Of course, that was before the sport-utility boom began in earnest and most non-Texans treated Suburbans as fleet vehicles or work trucks. But even today, Texas still accounts for 21 percent of the national Suburban market.

Suburbans are slightly less popular in Dallas than they are in the rest of the state. Here, they’re butting heads with the Ford Expedition and Lincoln Navigator. Though significantly smaller, the Ford and Lincoln are fresher and more striking than the aging Suburban, which is creaking along to an expected overhaul in a couple of years.

Nevertheless, the Suburban remains the premier full-size sport-utility vehicle in town-marginally in terms of raw numbers but incontestably deep in the hearts of true Texans. Garland engineer Neal Tapps, for example, spent 12 years scheming to buy one.

“I love everything about it-the look, the ride, the room, the storage capacity,” he says, “When I see it sitting there in my garage, I say to myself, ’This is mine, and I can drive it anytime 1 want to.”’

To newcomers, the most intimidating aspect of the Suburban is its almost incomprehensible size. Let’s face it- it’s not the ideal vehicle for, say, louring the hill towns of Tuscany. But the Suburban is perfectly suited to Texas’ open spaces, and it’s surprisingly easy to maneuver around city streets once you get the hang of using your mirrors and leaving lois of room to whoa it to a halt.

“Usually,” says Ken Thompson, the nation’s top Chevy salesman (at Frank Parra Chevrolet in Irving), “the husband will bring the wife along when he buys die Suburban, and she’ll tell him, ’If you want it. it’s your vehicle.’ But the next time I see them, she’s driving the Suburban, and he’s driving something else.”

Women are particularly fond of the elevated driving posilion, which allows them to survey traffic from a queenly perspective. They’re also sold on the safety record of a vehicle that’s virtually impervious to damage.

“The first week I had the Suburban,” Powe recalls, “I backed into a guy’s car and just ripped his door up. Well, there wasn’t even a scratch on my bumper, and my kids weren’t even jarred. The Suburban is a tank.”

Especially compared with the chrome-laden Navigator, the Suburban is humble and plain, and with so many of them on the road, a lively business in aftermarket customization has spaing up. Starting at $250 or so for a bare-bones cosmetic makeover-bug shield, vent shade, and taillight covers-you can drop $5,000 and a lot, lot more for running boards, grill guards, wheels and tires, a wood-and-leather interior, and a full-boat entertainment system.

“I had one boy who came in here and spent $25,000 in one week just on wheels,” says Mike Barreras, owner of Texas Custom Trucks in Lancaster.

But for most people, the stock Suburban is more than enough, a sport-utility vehicle in the truest sense of the phrase, a truck that’s equal parts daily driver, weekend warrior, and timeless icon. “Words can’t describe how I feel about it.” Tapps says. Maybe there isn’t a word big enough. -P.L.