Mel281
New member
My Facebook message to Toyota. I hope they get enough similar feedback from people to make some changes.
"I just want to say how shocked I am at how unfriendly this generation of Sienna is for families with young children. I just bought a 2006 Sienna and love it so far, but am not likely to even consider this new generation unless some changes are made. By far, the biggest disappointment and safety concern is the lack of upper tether anchors in the third row. In the second generation, Toyota was very competitive with Honda, having just one less upper tether anchor in the third row, but other advantages to make it more appealing to families. The eight seater was loved by the families on car seat safety forums. Now in this third generation, not only did you not match Honda's upper tether totals, you have dropped the numbers! This is a VERY important safety feature for our children to the age of 6 or so. It can't be that expensive to include. And while the 8th seat was equipped with a full LATCH set in the old Siennas, the new one is worthless. Small, and no lower anchors or upper tethers. Kids are in child seats longer than ever and a minivan should be designed to hold them all safely. In addition to the the insane lack of child seat friendly seating positions, the floor tracks in the second row look like crumb, dirt and food collecting magnets. The final bone I have to pick is that the folding of the third row was not easy to do one handed in the 2013 I looked at. What I think Toyota needs to do is keep the external styling of the new generation, but return to some of the basic concepts of the second. Offer an 8 seater option with 3 good sized seats, all of them should be fully LATCH equipped, and for goodness sakes, offer it in the higher end packages! And arm rests would be a bonus. Make the third row have 3 upper tethers!! Why not? At LEAST give it two. Seriously, it cannot cost that much. Also, the tumbling seats in the older generation are great, I feel much better than sliders. I think if you considered these points for your next model year, your sales would be so much improved. You can read all about the disappointment of mothers regarding the current generation Sienna on the forums of www.car-seat.org."
"I just want to say how shocked I am at how unfriendly this generation of Sienna is for families with young children. I just bought a 2006 Sienna and love it so far, but am not likely to even consider this new generation unless some changes are made. By far, the biggest disappointment and safety concern is the lack of upper tether anchors in the third row. In the second generation, Toyota was very competitive with Honda, having just one less upper tether anchor in the third row, but other advantages to make it more appealing to families. The eight seater was loved by the families on car seat safety forums. Now in this third generation, not only did you not match Honda's upper tether totals, you have dropped the numbers! This is a VERY important safety feature for our children to the age of 6 or so. It can't be that expensive to include. And while the 8th seat was equipped with a full LATCH set in the old Siennas, the new one is worthless. Small, and no lower anchors or upper tethers. Kids are in child seats longer than ever and a minivan should be designed to hold them all safely. In addition to the the insane lack of child seat friendly seating positions, the floor tracks in the second row look like crumb, dirt and food collecting magnets. The final bone I have to pick is that the folding of the third row was not easy to do one handed in the 2013 I looked at. What I think Toyota needs to do is keep the external styling of the new generation, but return to some of the basic concepts of the second. Offer an 8 seater option with 3 good sized seats, all of them should be fully LATCH equipped, and for goodness sakes, offer it in the higher end packages! And arm rests would be a bonus. Make the third row have 3 upper tethers!! Why not? At LEAST give it two. Seriously, it cannot cost that much. Also, the tumbling seats in the older generation are great, I feel much better than sliders. I think if you considered these points for your next model year, your sales would be so much improved. You can read all about the disappointment of mothers regarding the current generation Sienna on the forums of www.car-seat.org."
