Up Close With the 2009 Dodge Journey

• I know from photos that the Dodge Journey looks pretty good, but for any new car — especially a Chrysler (including Dodge and Jeep) product — the interior quality is an important consideration. This is a new model and another chance for Dodge to step it up, and my first impression is blah. Overall, the materials don't knock me out.
  
  Oddly enough, the dash top is soft to the touch, but it doesn't look great. More often we see surfaces that look pretty good but don't pass the touch test. Most puzzling is the LCD screen, which appears at the bottom of the center control panel. This one appeared to be audio only and not a navigation system, but I'm not sure it matters. This is awfully low for a driver who's supposed to be watching the road. — Joe Wiesenfelder, 4:02 p.m.

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2009 Dodge Journey

Comments

[JM]

the metal-lined shifter and dual toned leather seats acctually look pretty good, but hoestly the rest of the cabin looks cheap...

[Troy in Ft Walton Beach]

The steering wheel looks like it came from the early 90's Caravan parts bin. The cup holder in the door is neat.

[Liger]

What is going on at Dodge? That interior looks so cheap. Looks like the recycled the interior of of a 1990 Dodge Shadow.....

[Infosaur]

To be honest Liger, Dodge's designs have been so bad lately going back to the 90's might be an improvement.

Sadly that's almost 20 years ago already.

It's almost retro!

(Hmmmm could this mean a return of the Sprit R/T Turbo?)

[DodgeFan]

I can see some nice small details. Like leather wraped steering wheel and the metically lines on steering wheel. Looks like nice big wents. Hopefully this is the lowest end interior since the gray rubbermaid interior never worked. I would prefered that did it in traditional all black if they were going to do this like my 94 Intrepid. I hope that stereo went through tests groups because except from trying to be different I don't see a good reason to switch up. Overall, being forgiving like others I see some nice touches but hate the gray plastic. I only take my plastic in black. Surprising my black plastic in my 94 intrepid is soft on the dash too.

[Zerf]

I agree on the screen. I am not sure why anyone would put a screen that big in a car if it just audio functions and not for nav purposes. Only exception I can think of is the Prius that uses it to show fuel economy. I am not sure what Chrysler was thinking here other then to try to cause more accidents by getting people take their eyes off the road. What amazes me is no one at Chrysler looked at this at any point and said dumb design change and don't show it to the press like that...have another beer guys...

[Daz]

R u sure it's not navi? I've seen interior pix with a regular Chrysler CD player with all the buttons. I agree, it's way toooo low in the center stack!