I have said in the past that you never ever EVER put a rear facing child seat in the front seat of a car. In fact you just don’t put a child in the front seat period. (For more info about child safety take our online class.) Leave it to Volvo to go and change things up!

Right now they are considering adding a rear facing built in infant/child seat where the front passenger seat would be to Volvo’s XC90 Excellence model as part of its luxury “Lounge Console Concept.” This would enable the driver and/or rear passenger to always maintain eye contact with their baby.

Volvo said that they, “focused on three key benefits — making it easier to get the child into and out of the child seat from an ergonomic and comfort perspective, providing the child with a safe rearward facing seating position that enables it to keep eye-contact with either the driver or the rear passenger and of course including enough storage for those vital child accessories, such as diapers, bottles, wipes, and so on.”

A Volvo spokesman made it clear that should this car go into development that they front passenger airbags would be disabled. He went onto say that, “For us the safety, convenience, and emotional factors outweigh everything else,” Johnson said. “Being able to maintain eye contact with your child from the rear seat , or being able to keep a bottle warm in the heated cup holders in the XC90 Excellence, would go a long way towards making life easier for parents taking their small child on a trip. Such alternative seating arrangements will become increasingly important as we move towards autonomous vehicles.”

In the US, child deaths in traffic accidents have been declining over the past decade as more parents are strapping their kids into car seats. But research from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration shows that 46% of people are misusing car and booster seats.

When and if Volvo do debut this car it may run into some legal problems in the USA where having a child in the front seat is illegal in some states. If and when it does come out it could make traveling with a baby safer and smoother! (Provigil) As always, DRIVE SAFE!