New kid in town

One of the warhorses of the American road has just undergone a major retread. The Volkswagen Jetta is ubiquitous as a people-mover in the U.S. From transporting yuppies with lattes in their cup holders when it’s new and shiny to hauling shoestring college students when it’s rusty and tattered, the Jetta has done it all. Even more than the New Beetle, the 25-year-old Jetta is the most approachable German car.

My friend Ed is incredibly loyal to the Volkswagen Jetta. I helped him buy his first one in, I think, 1989, and he only recently traded it in for a new 2004 model. He loves Jettas and has had a very good experience with both cars. I’ve seldom met an unhappy Jetta owner.

The fate of this new $17,900 Jetta is very important for VW. The company’s sales were down 25 percent through the first half of 2005. VW has suffered quality problems (the Jetta is rated below the cheaper Hyundai Sonata by J.D. Power and Associates), and its products face stiff competition. At one time, you’d give the Jetta extra points over, say, the Honda Civic, for being built in Europe, but the last I heard most Jettas were actually put together in Mexico. And the Civic sets new quality standards, anyway.

The new model’s luster has already been tarnished by a recall announced in July involving a fuel line clamp that could cause a leak. Some 39,000 Jettas have been called back. The company didn’t need the aggravation since it led to bloggers posting things like: "Gee, a recall from VW? The company known for fine quality – NOT!" To which some wit added, "Might as well recall the whole fleet because they messed up on the look. They thought they [were] building a Toyota Corolla."

OK, enough Jetta bashing. Let’s look at the actual car. The new styling is definitely controversial, but I think it’s nicely modern with a definite Japanese influence. Yes, there are Corolla overtones, but I like the Corolla look a lot and it’s inherently more aerodynamic than the older models.

For your $20K, the Jetta is powered by a 2.5-liter, 150-horsepower five-cylinder engine. In our tester, it was mated to the optional six-speed automatic, which doesn’t make the best use of the VW’s power band. It’s not quick off the line this Jetta (nine seconds to 60) and, on the highway, it’s somewhat slow to respond to a lead foot. The auto version can be manually shifted, but the standard five-speed manual is the better choice.

There will be other versions of the Jetta, of course. The GLI model will offer a 200-horsepower turbo engine and fully independent rear suspension and the TDI turbodiesel should be a fuel-economy champ.

In 2.5-liter form, the relatively heavy Jetta delivers 22 mpg in town and 30 on the highway, which isn’t terrible. There’s also a Partial-Zero Emission Vehicle version available in states that follow California emission laws. Speaking of the environment, the Jetta platform (shared with the Golf V) is also an ideal base for a hybrid VW. If I were Volkswagen, a hybrid Jetta would be a no-brainer. Using the base engine in tandem with an unobtrusive electric motor should yield as much horsepower as the GLI model, but with better gas mileage. Using a smaller gas engine would produce a competitor for the runaway hit known as the Prius.

Comparisons between the Jetta and Prius are interesting because, in July, they sold in the U.S. at almost exactly the same rate: just below 10,000. The Prius is supposed to be a niche vehicle and the Jetta is mainstream all the way, so these results should be a wake-up call to a company that’s been concentrating on the newly lucrative Chinese market. A hybrid Jetta? Whadya say?