SLIDESHOW
SUVs the world forgot about
SUVs can be seen on every street corner in 2022, but it wasn’t very long ago that they were rare choices. Many launched in decades past are hardly remembered, and even some of those that had a formative inf luence on the SUV as we know it today are seldom seen in traffic. So join us for a look at some of the forgotten cars that competed in the class long before it was cool.
RONAN GLON
Saab 9-7X 2005
The first of two very odd cars delivered near Saab’s sad end, the 9-7X was symbolic of General Motors’ mismanagement of the once fabulous company. The SUV had very little to do with Saab and a lot to do with the ubiquitous T360 platform that also gave the world the likes of the Chevrolet Trailblazer and Oldsmobile Bravada. It was the most expensive among its sundry siblings and came loaded with kit to try to compete in the premium market. GM did at least give it Saab’s signature quirk, a centrally located ignition, but the rest didn’t succeed in obscuring all the blue-collar underpinnings. Some 86,000 9-7Xs emerged from Ohio before both it and the factory that made it were killed off. Saab’s first SUV proved to be its last.