Toyota Avalon Sports ADAS Features, Safety Connect Offer

This week, Toyota unveiled the latest version of its flagship Avalon four-door sedan, which boasts a slew of advanced driver assistance system (ADAS) features and connectivity options.

For its fifth generation, Toyota outfitted the Avalon with Safety Connect and Service Connect, which both come with a three-year trial period, and Remote Connect, which comes with a six-month trial.

Remote Connect allows drivers to lock or unlock their doors, start the engine or check their fuel level from a smartwatch or Amazon Alexa-enabled device. This feature is also voice activated and compatible with a number of Android or Apple devices.

Toyota is also offering a WiFi trial through Verizon, with up to 2GB within six months, and the sedan also comes with the Entune 3.0 infotainment system, a Scout GPS Link application, while Apple’s CarPlay platform is also standard on all models.

The sedan’s nine-inch multimedia system displays audio and navigation, and integrates the car’s climate control system, while the Scout GPS Link app offers voice-activated search, with results shown on the display.

Below the screen is a slide-open bin containing a 12-volt plug and the standard wireless Qi mobile device charger, with a trio of USB power ports — making for five total — located inside the center console.

Behind the steering wheel, a seven-inch multi-information display shows vehicle information, turn-by-turn navigation, and various vehicle settings, such as those pertaining to lane departure alert with steering assist, intelligent clearance sonar and head-up display (HUD).

On the Limited and Touring models, a standard color 10-inch HUD projects important info, such as vehicle and engine speeds, turn-by-turn directions, audio settings, and drive mode, right onto the lower portion of the windshield.

The Avalon’s standard Toyota Safety Sense P (TSS-P) suite of safety systems and technologies includes a pre-collision system with pedestrian detection, which is designed to alert the driver — and may apply the brakes — if it detects a potential frontal collision with another vehicle.

Another safety feature is full-speed range dynamic radar cruise control, which uses radar located behind the Toyota badge plus a camera on the windshield designed to help maintain a safe distance from the car in front.

Automatic high beam activation aids night-time driving by using a camera to detect headlights and tail-lights of preceding vehicles, and toggling accordingly between high and low beams, and additional standard safety technology includes a blind spot monitor with rear cross traffic alert.

Toyota isn’t alone in rolling out ADAS features and connected car features for its mid-market vehicles. Rival Nissan recently beefed up the standard safety feature set for its Rouge Sport model, offering as standard auto emergency braking (AEB), blind spot warning (BSW) and rear cross traffic alert (RCTA) on all 2018.5 models.

Automakers across the globe have been scrambling to showcase their own ADAS technologies, from Ford’s CoPilot360 suite of safety features to Daimler’s Active Distance Assist Distronic found on its Mercedes sedans.