Hyundai Curb Crossover debuts at NAIAS

Hyundai California Design Center and Hyundai Motor America are presenting at this year’s North American International Auto Show in Detroit the Curb concept vehicle, a compact Urban Activity Vehicle (UAV) aiming at the next generation of car buyers.

Evolving from Hyundai’s “Fluidic Sculpture” design language, the look of the Curb concept was created having in mind younger buyers. Designers at Hyundai wanted to create an urban car that was loaded with technology.

“We wanted the Curb to be urban tough without looking like a Brink's truck,” said Jason Brown, Hyundai designer. “City driving was going to be its forte, not crossing the Rubicon trail, but we wanted it to have urban armor for daily driving on city streets. It needed to empower its passengers in this setting.”

Exterior design features include the wraps around the cowl, covering the A pillars, the profile boomerang trajectory bodyside line, the thin, sleek headlamps and taillamps and the 22-inch five spoke wheels and Michelin tires with a custom saffron colored tread pattern to match the interior.

According to Arash Badeanlou, Hyundai designer “The world has never seen lines like this on a car before. It is as if the architect Santiago Calatrava inspired it.”

The Curb concept has been used by Hyundai as a tester of the brand’s all-new Blue Link telematics system, a technology that enables Generation Y to be connected to their electronics at all times.

“The goal was to make sure passengers felt connected to each other and the urban environment around them,” said Bradley Arnold, Curb interior designer. “We wanted to empower the passengers with information and make them feel that the exterior was connected to the interior.”

Passengers are able to pass information between them thanks to a large acrylic touchscreen with multiple zones.

The Curb concept is powered by a turbocharged 1.6-liter Gasoline Direct Injection (GDI) four-cylinder engine mated to a Direct Shift Gearbox (DSG) that produces 175 hp and 229 Nm of torque.