KEEP ON TRUCKING SUV, PICKUP SALES BOOM.

Byline: Nicholas Grudin Staff Writer

SANTA CLARITA - Their names evoke daydreams of safaris and dirt roads, but in Santa Clarita, the greatest adventure that most sport utility vehicles see is a row of speed bumps at the mall.

Nonetheless, the Expeditions, Xterras and Sequoias - along with minivans and pickup trucks which are in the same ``light truck'' category - surpass all other cars as the most popular new vehicles in the valley, matching a national trend.

More than half of the new automobiles sold at Santa Clarita dealerships this year have been light trucks, a significantly higher proportion than the rest of Los Angeles County, according to figures reported by the Greater Los Angeles New Car Dealers Association.

``I've been in the business for 20 years, and I've never seen anything like it,'' said Don Fleming, owner of Valencia Acura and president of the Santa Clarita Auto Dealers Association. ``It's bizarre - it is a huge percentage.''

Throughout Los Angeles and the nation, SUVs have enjoyed tremendous popularity.

Out of more than 10,000 new cars sold at valley dealerships this year, 52 percent of them were SUVs, pickups or minivans.

In Los Angeles County, light trucks made up 43 percent of sales.

``At this particular store, it's uncanny,'' said Cisco McGregor, sales manager at Power Dodge of Valencia, where nearly 90 percent of sales are SUVs and trucks. ``Cars are not the hot thing on market.''

The 2002 nationwide numbers were on par with Santa Clarita, and this year, the sale of luxury SUVs is on the rise.

Fleming attributes his dealership's SUV success to Santa Clarita's young, upper-class population, where families with the need for spacious vehicles are among his primary buyers.

His Acura dealership sells only one model of SUV - the luxury MDX - and it alone accounts for 37 percent of this year's sales out of eight models on the lot.

``It's demographics,'' Fleming said. ``The people out here can afford them. They've got the TVs and the video games in the back. These Santa Clarita soccer moms love the SUVs.''

McGregor, whose Dodge dealership has sold almost 10 times as many trucks and SUVs as cars, says that a large part of Santa Clarita's demand for bigger vehicles is the combination of rural surroundings and suburban culture.

``It's a little more country here,'' said McGregor, although he acknowledged that many buyers use the trucks for more suburban tasks. ``There's a lot of new housing up here, and people need trucks to haul things back and forth from Home Depot.''

But the swelling popularity of the SUV has translated into a headache for environmentalists, who partially blame the gas-guzzlers for Santa Clarita's air pollution problem, which was the worst in the country last year.

``We have to be close to the SUV capital of the world,'' said Lynne Plambeck, president of the Santa Clarita Organization for Planning and the Environment.

``It's one thing if you need a truck for your business,'' Plambeck said. ``It's another thing to drive your kids back and forth to school - you need to think about the external marginal cost of these cars. They make more air pollution than anything else.''

Although some SUVs, like the Acura MDX, which gets 23 miles per gallon on the freeway, have improved their emissions standards to match the standards of new sedans, others continue to guzzle.

The popular 2003 Hummer, for example, averages just over 11 mpg, and, with gas prices soaring above $2 per gallon, drivers' pocket books could be the only obstacle for Santa Clarita's SUV sales.

Nicholas Grudin, [phone]

nicholas.grudin(at)dailynews.com

CAPTION(S):

2 photos

Photo:

(1 -- color) Along San Fernando Road, the billboard blends in with traffic, where the vehicle of choice is a truck or an SUV.

(2 -- color) At one prominent auto dealer along auto row in Valencia, only SUVs and trucks can be seen by passing motorists.

David R. Crane/Staff Photographer