I keep thinking back to this Microlino at Fully Charged Live. Reusable water bottles became acceptable, being vegan is now cool, and so is wearing vintage clothes. So who is going to step up to the critical task of making small cars fashionable? The trend towards giant SUVs is ludicrous, incredibly wasteful and dangerous, and bad for our cities. If you must use a car, it should be as small as possible. Where are the micro-car visionaries/influencers? WE NEED YOU. #cars#SUV#climate
What must come hand in hand is infrastructure and regulations that are friendly for smaller vehicles. The large dangerous trucks should be heavily taxed to discourage their use, not get subsidies. This unfortunately isn't the case in many places of the world.
When the majority of drivers choose to drive ridiculously large vehicles it also forces others to get larger ones just for their own safety. Even if they would otherwise drive smaller vehicles.
I took that picture yesterday. There are four vehicles. One is to carry goods. One is fun to drive. One can carry a family of five and their luggage for a small weekend break in comfort. And one pretends to be all of above but it's utterly stupid.
@helenczerski Japan has a simple, elegant solution: no free parking anywhere. There is no street parking in the whole country, and before you can buy a car, you have to get a certificate showing you actually have a place to park it at your home/apartment building. This incentivizes small cars because people want their parking space to take up as little area as possible, and discourages car use in general since you have to pay for parking everywhere you go.
At least they are smart enough to sell it as a lifestyle product instead of aiming at the more rational type of buyer which - while initially interested - will quickly realize that a larger used car is much better value for money and will buy such one.
@helenczerski You are quite right. I worry about the incentives being different from the good examples you mention: small cars are cheaper and usually sold by companies that also make larger more expensive cars.
@helenczerski I can't see having a m8crocar over a bicycle except in the coldest, wettest climates. My Honda Fit is the perfect size for me, my wife, her walker, and whatever has to come back from the grocery store.
@helenczerski I completely agree electric SUVs should be de-incentivized (as opposed to how dominant they now are here are in Norway) but I see little use for such microcars compared to a cargo e-bike as long as there is good biking infrastructure.
@helenczerski always great to cycle on a narrower city street and some chunky SUV behind you honking at you, because there's not enough space for the car to pass. My brother in Christ, you chose to drive this car that is comically impractical, so you have to wait for me.
@helenczerski Saw this one (along many others oft similar size) in the outskirts of Amsterdam last week. To me it looks like people there don't need a #wankpanzer to add to their ego as much as Germans do. <3 it!
@helenczerski Yes it's cool, but it's only purpose is to transport a single individual. Not cargo, not passengers, not children. A thoroughly redundant product.
@helenczerski I feel like a lot of car trips should be transit trips (and we should fund transit accordingly), but small cars would definitely mitigate the climate and safety problems with cars (including electric cars, there's no climate friendly way to make an object out of several tons of steel and then propel it around at high speeds)
Some city workers in my city use these tricycle-cars which seem ideal for a city in the rare cases that properly funded transit could not meet someone's needs
@helenczerski I like this, but it assumes drivers are using the car to transport only themselves. A train could transport myself but not myself and a bunch of large and fragile materials or sculptures? I pretty much never have to second guess if things will fit in my minivan. A sedan can barely hold a big roll of bubble wrap, or a doze, 8 foot glass tubes.
@helenczerski
I love small cars. But you can't now buy them. Our Citigo (a VW Up clone) will need replacing in 3 or 4 years. These models aren't being replaced.
Small cars are too small to be electric: batteries too large at the moment. So we need to keep making small petrol cars. I don't believe they need to contribute any more to climate change than the medium sized electric cars that are their only alternative*.
Active travel and public transport are also, theoretically, available.
@helenczerski My first car was a Ligier and my second a Microcar. Both brands of microcars. Perfect for the city. But diesels. Only 5 liters per week. But still: diesel.
@helenczerski
Considering the lack of infrastructure in a lot of areas EVs like the Aptera would be better in a lot of cases, at least for the transition to a non ice era. Basic selfcharging, WAY fancier looking and more range than most of regular, small EVs...
Hope it'll be on most of at least the fully charged shows.
We need more efficient vehicles IF we chose owning or renting/sharing "cars".
@helenczerski that is kinda happening with the import of the old tiny Japanese trucks. The Intelligence podcast from the Economist did a thing on it a weke or so ago.
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