Despite the fact that Toyota is taking a lot of heat for not addressing the gas pedal problems in its vehicles that resulted in many accidents and injuries, there is some positive safety news about the Japanese automaker. According to IIHS, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, both the Scion xB and the Toyota Corolla have earned the safety organization’s designation as Top Safety Picks.

To qualify as a Top Safety Pick, vehicles must earn a rating of “good” – the highest rating possible – in the front, side, rollover and rear-impact crash tests run by the Insititute, and they must also be equipped with electronic stability control. The Corolla and xB are the first Toyota models to earn such a designation, since the required criteria were tightened by the Institute, with the addition of the new rollover test this year.

The specifics behind a “good” rollover rating are that the vehicle’s roof must support the equivalent of four times the vehicle’s weight (as compared with the current Federal standard of only 1.5 times the weight), said a representative of the IIHS. In the Institute’s test, the Corolla’s roof supported 5.1 times the car’s weight, while the xB’s roof withstood a force equal to 6.8 times the car’s weight.

Institute president Adrian Lund told the press, “Top Safety Pick recognizes the vehicles that afford buyers the best overall protection in common crashes. With more top performers, there’s no reason to buy a small car with less than stellar crash test ratings.”

Both the xB and the Corolla also earned the 2009 Top Safety Pick award.