2009 Toyota Sienna Review

Hi, I’m Bill Jackson. We’re here with the 2009 Toyota Sienna. Yes, it's a minivan but
once you get pass the stigma that minivan sometimes have, what you’d left with is a car
that’s very capable and very comfortable.

One of the things that’s actually kind of surprising about the Sienna is it is very
comfortable to drive. And what I mean by that is it moves away from the South like, it's
very well, it's very capable in the highways as far as passing and merging. If there’s a
downside, it's this steering at highway speed. It’s very, very light. I almost feel like I was
playing a video game, but if I we’re carrying kids around all day and/or for most of my
driving was in the city, I don’t think I’d really mind that so much.

Now, one of the things I really like about the Sienna after driving it for about a week is its
overall layout. The visibility is great for all directions which is really nice if you’re
driving in the city or you’re carrying kids, that kind of thing. But the other part of it is
just how the controls are laid out. I mean we have a three-zone climate control system.
It's very straightforward and very intuitive, not all cars are like that, and it’s a nice touch.
Other things also really seem like they intended to actually use this car and buy it when
they designed little things like there’s these little cubby here, perfect place to put a phone
or an MP3 player. You can stream that through Bluetooth to the stereo which is good or if
you’re like me then use an auxiliary jack, the jack is just right up here. It's convenient, it's
nice.

Again, the cap holders have tons of different sizes as you’d expect including this nice
adjustable one which came in handy. And then like for instance this, it's just a simple
little note pad area but if you’ll stop the stop light or anything and you need to write
something down, it’s just right where your hand would fold.

Now, one of the things I have told you that really could have improved on is the power
rear hatch. There is no button here. It automatically lift it, you have to use the fob. It takes
a wide open again, that's just kind of normal. Where we really have a problem with it is
in closing the hatch. The best system that I think have a button somewhere down here
low where short person can easily reach it to press the button and the hatch closes. Again,
with the Sienna which I have to use is the button on the fob, you press it, hold it and it
shots. If you don’t want to do that, get inside and there’s a button up in the headline that
you compress and it shots.

Now, we’ve been over the power hatch. One of the things I like is that Sienna doesn’t
have power that rotates. It's actually a very simple, a very easy to use system. It’s a
simple matter of pulling the strap and then lock in place and then this strap and you have
seat back. It doesn’t require a lot of effort. I think it's pretty easy to figure out.

Now, we’ve been over the Toyota Sienna and a lot of its features some of which I'm
pretty fond of, some which I'm not. But overall, I think this is the type of vehicle that
makes lot of sense for people if they have to carry a lot of cargo or other passengers. In
particular, I think the fact that it’s very comfortable and easy to drive really speaks well
for it.

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