The new 2007 Hyundai Santa Fe sport-ute reminds us of a less-stocky Infiniti FX from the front and a Subaru B9 Tribeca from the rear and sides. It features a flat-folding third row of seats, a first for Hyundai. The Santa Fe grows seven inches in length and three inches in width, which also distances it from the Tucson cute-ute. Look for the Santa Fe to improve upon its carlike driving characteristics, as it dropped its control-arm rear suspension for a multilink setup while retaining a strut-type front-suspension. The Santa Fe will offer two aluminum-block V-6s with 180 or 230 hp; the larger is a 3.3-liter that will be paired with a version of Hyundai's nice five-speed automatic from the new Azera.
Stability control and air bags for all three rows of seats should help make the Santa Fe a fairly safe sanctuary, and features such as power-adjustable pedals, rear-seat DVD entertainment, and rain-sensing windshield wipers are likely to sway some buyers away from more well-established makers' costlier and thirstier SUVs.
The Santa Fe will be built alongside the Sonata in Montgomery, Alabama. It goes on sale in the summer of 2006; Hyundai, celebrating its twentieth year of car sales in the United States, promises that the Santa Fe will be priced thousands of dollars less than a comparably equipped Toyota Highlander.