Kia Sedona: A dollar-wise alternative for expanding families

Ah, the minivan. That target of stand-up comedians and patronizing waves at shopping malls, even as it performs its thankless chores with versatility and forbearance. Kind of like parents.

Still, I know parents who would rather ride on the back of a garbage truck than be seen driving a minivan.

That dismissive stance inevitably turns into a distress call when families add a second, third or fourth child, procreating themselves into the minivan demographic. And when they realize that a large SUV is less space-efficient than a minivan, some take the final plunge into self-sacrificing parenthood, holding their noses all the way down.

Minivans may be down, but they're not out. Toyota has smartly revamped its Sienna for 2015. Honda hit a home run when it offered the Odyssey with a built-in, Cheerio-devouring HondaVac for easy cleanups.

To wield the HondaVac, however, one must spend more than $45,000 on the top-dog Touring Elite version of the Odyssey. The Sienna, too, can shoot past $46,000 when fully optioned.

That's a lot of money for a minivan, which brings us to the Kia Sedona.

Better-looking than your average minivan, with outstanding features and ergonomics — and a 10-year, 100,000-mile warranty — the Sedona starts at $26,795, some $3,000 less than the most affordable Odyssey, the LX.

Unlike many minivans, which undertake styling advances cautiously, the 2015 Sedona proudly announces its redesign. A van that looked strip-mall generic is suddenly streamlined and appealing — or as streamlined as you're going to make a vehicle that's shaped like a shipping crate.

If fashionistas can avoid snickering, I might venture that the Sedona is the best-looking of the current minivans, adopting the aggressive jut and contours of a modern crossover utility vehicle. A smartly creased hood is fronted by what Kia calls its tiger nose grille, a pet cue of the designer Peter Schreyer, president of the Hyundai Motor Group, who oversees Hyundai and Kia styling.

The minivan's boxy shape limits styling freedom from the windshield back, but Kia does what it can. The doors are subtly scalloped, front and rear overhangs have been shortened and available 19-inch aluminum wheels nicely stuff the arches. The window frames between the second and third rows kick upward in Honda fashion.

The appeal continues inside. A horizontal dashboard, with a central touch screen and ruler-straight row of large switches, is calming and uncluttered. Binocular-shaped binnacles house the driver's gauges, bisected by a sharp display for various vehicle functions controlled from the small-diameter steering wheel by a set of Audi-style thumbwheels.

As in other new Kias and Hyundais, the big, crisp touch screen for navigation, audio, phone and apps is one of the industry's best, in part because operating it is child's play. In every way imaginable, Kia's controls whip the Honda's horror-show of awkward menus and a rotary control knob that can confound even simple tasks.

Keeping tabs on the children remains a minivan priority, and the Kia mostly scores. Unlike other minivans, Kia plunks a standard, SUV-style front storage console between the front seats. There's the requisite cup holder overload - 12 in this case - but some minivans offer a few more cubbies for family detritus.

The Sedona comes in seven- or eight-passenger configurations, with either a three-position bench in the rear or a pair of captain's chairs. Compared with the previous Sedona, Kia lifted the hip point of the front seats to improve outward visibility. A 1.6-inch wheelbase stretch delivers a bit more legroom in all rows. That way-back row, split 60/40, smoothly pivots and tucks into the floor. For the second row, standard Slide-N-Stow seats pivot and fold against the front seat backs for more cargo space, but they can't be easily removed.

For the top-level SX Limited, the conversation piece is the First Class lounge seating in the second row, which provides flip-up legrests and a extending footrest like the top-shelf Sienna. Borrowing a trick from airliners, their winged headrests swivel to cradle the passenger's neck.

Those chairs slide well fore-and-aft. They also slide inboard to help parents reach child seats or outboard to open a gap where third-row riders can take advantage of extra legroom.

My 8-year-old daughter, who can be blasé about $100,000 cars, loved the lounge seats.

Seats in all three rows of the SXL (as the van's tailgate badge reads) are wrapped in soft Nappa leather, and the dual sunroofs open electrically, in contrast with the fixed rear panels in many vehicles.

For other trim levels, Kia offers a new upholstery fabric with anti-microbial and anti-static properties, along with the ability to repel and release stains.

The new-generation Sedona feels solid and quiet, with generous sound deadening throughout and a chassis that, according to Kia, has 36 percent greater torsional stiffness than its closest segment competitor. Ultra-high-strength steel tubes inside the front roof pillars bolster the Sedona's roof-crush safety. An available power liftgate opens automatically after three seconds when a driver approaching with the key fob is sensed.

With 276 horsepower and 248 pound-feet of torque, the 3.3-liter V6 is a bit more potent than the 3.5-liter it replaces. It's also smoother and quieter, and this V6 is a high point in the engine portfolio of Kia and Hyundai. Acceleration is solid, though the 6-speed automatic transmission sometimes hesitates to downshift.

Fuel economy remains this engine's handicap. When hauling the 4,650 pounds of the SXL, the V6 is rated at 17 mpg in town and 22 on the highway. Sedonas with fewer features go as high as 18/25 mpg, roughly on par with Toyota and Chrysler vans but short of the Honda's 19/28 mpg.

Beyond its $40,595 base price, the SXL that I tested had a $2,700 Technology Package with adaptive cruise control, forward-collision and lane-departure warnings, a surround-view monitor and xenon headlamps. The total came to $43,295; a rear-seat entertainment system is $995 more.

Like most new Kias, this handsome, smartly equipped Sedona gets a lot right. Yet the Sedona also shows that driving dynamics can be a weak spot for the brand.