Society’s got priorities wrong.
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most car travels are 1 person or sometimes 2 person
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the majority of car travels are quite short, less than 40km.
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many car travels are just to get some groceries or drop of a little package or just say “hi” to someone, carrying nothing but themselves.
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cars are fucking expensive, to buy and to maintain
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accidents become way worse with heavier vehicles
Microcar is a valid answer to all of these, while still being sheltered from weather.
How are urban places (i’m in Belgium) with almost permanent super heavy road traffic congestion, bad climate statistics, high polution values, very limited available space left, no self-sustaining energy production and high traffic accident statistics still pooring in billions and billions in subsidies year after year into “regular” big heavy SUV-like vehicles instead of these? It’s beyond my comprehension. The only real valid reason i somewhat get is the collective scare of being in a crash and not wanting to be in the smaller vehicle. We could save the climate, we choose not to.
- MICROLINO: 17.990 €
- OPEL ROCKS: 8.699 €
- CITROEN AMI: 7.790 €
- RENAULT TWIZY: 13.000 €
- FIAT TOPOLINO: 9.890 €
A lot of people here casually spend more on a sunday racing bike every few years for fucks sake.
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What cities actually need:
M E T R O
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Sometimes people do need a car, and if they do I would prefer it to be a small little thing like this rather than something larger.
These kinds of car are quite popular in Amsterdam, for instanceAmsterdam?
B I C Y C L E
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I want to ride my bicycle, bicycle, bicycle
I want my country to have 1/10 the bicycle infrastructure of the Netherlands. We’re in the dark ages by comparison.
Still better than France or Germany though, at least we got that going for us
Metro unfortunately isn’t a solution in urban sprawled, urban planning disaster Flanders. It’s dense yet too spread out. Metro is good for very dense urban cores like Brussels. But it’s not the one big end all problems solution. Metro is part of what cities need, but not the only thing.
Metro unfortunately isn’t a solution in urban sprawled, urban planning disaster
It is, because it creates the nodes of transit around which higher density building can be built.
Urban sprawl is a consequence of poor mass transit, not a cause of it.
Here among other reasons it’s a historic consequence of few building regulations for 150 years combined with a dominant Christian party 150y actively trying to keep as many people as possible sprawled out in villages around cities because they thought masses moving to the cities would turn them into revolutionary heretic communists.
would turn them into revolutionary heretic communists
I mean, that’s just another advantage of having a metro
I think its more of a modern contrivance than that. The Robert Moses plan for New York was enormously profitable for real estate developers. There’s definitely a certain nostalgic element to the pastiche of smaller and more remote towns. But the modern suburbs system is far more about urban segregation and real estate commercialization (mega-malls, movie theaters, gas stations, etc) than economic evangelicalism.
i mean that just sounds like stockholm lol, also if you can’t quite justify a metro then you just build a baby metro, otherwise called light rail (or fuck it, actual tramlines)
a lot of it unfortunately is too sprawled for tramlines to make sense.
You can see the border between belgium and the netherlands on this pop density map: https://www.luminocity3d.org/WorldPopDen/#9/51.2885/4.5607
Netherlands: “clustered towns with a center”. Flanders: “wtf just happened?” We have approximately 13.000 km of “linear settlement”
looking at the map, light rail seems like it should work fine? It’s not that sprawly, there are pretty clear urban clusters that you could just slap some rail onto the roads going between.
i think you’re presuming the transport has to be profitable? which obviously will only ever justify some subway lines in metropoles and train lines connecting major cities.
No it’s just always a battle for space. The linear settlements the old roads run through are wide enough for 1 lane in each direction, 2 narrow sidewalks and perhaps a narrow cycle path. Enter tram: it’s either stuck in traffic with the cars or they have to decide to ban cars and no longer serve the hundreds of driveways on a route, politicians don’t have the balls for that, not even the green ones. I wish they would.
Idk why I saw this and thought use it as a super confusing battle ship board like TR mis
Looks like we are back to the 1950’s and the time of the “Smooch bubble” BMW Isetta. I always loved the look of this car.
BMW Isetta
Or, for our American audience, The Urkelmobile
Oh my God that’s what it is! I know this was familiar. The front wall is a door.
Liebe für die Knutschkugel!
Generally love microcars, especially the 50cc variant that, here in Germany at least, are really cheap to maintain because you pay no tax beyond the initial vat and insurance is like 50€ a year. Sadly the cars aren’t all that cheap with newer models easily surpassing cheap regular cars, rendering them kinda moot.
The microlino is litterally modelled after this classic!
Nevermind all of that. The number one reason not to drive in Belgium is Belgian drivers. In other countries there’s the occasional assholish driver, in Belgium, it’s completely normal and expected to drive like a cunt.
There’s indeed a chance I’ll get myself hurt while forcing cars to stop at zebra crossings and giving drivers my middle finger when they’re blocking crossings while they’re in a traffic jam. German and Dutch drivers are really friendly by comparison.
Tbh France and Italy are like that too
Absolutely not. French drivers are curteous and friendly in comparison to the Germans, and infinitely better than the Belgians.
In Italy, you have to understand that you have to drive like the rest of traffic, in a flexible manner, and not strictly like the rules say, and it’ll go smoothly.
You see these fairly often in Amsterdam; half of them are driven by the elderly and disabled and the other half are driven by burgeoning adult daughters of the rich as some bizarre fashion statement. There’s a local company too called Heen & Weer (which means “there and back” or “back and forth”) who taxi the elderly and disabled in one of these for €1 a go, which is a splendid, splendid idea.
Is their logo this ))<>(( ?
I like the one on bottom right. So cute ❤️
Yeah, they really are adorable. I really like the top left one. It looks really weird without ‘conventional’ headlights, but I kinda dig it. But I’d want it in bright yellow, or lemon green, or something. Cute.
Edit: but I would change the rims, I want the bottom right rims.
The three at the bottom are all essentially the same car but with different trim from different manufacturers. The ‘original’ is the Citroen Ami and it’s an absolute blast to drive.
almost permanent super heavy road traffic congestion, bad climate statistics, high polution values, very limited available space left
Fixing that starts with congestion charges. If the charges go up with more polluting and heavy vehicles, electrical lighter vehicles and public transportation suddenly become a lot more interesting.
Or
Electric bicycle / electric bike / electric trike.
Half the price, double the mileage, double the speed+acceleration, half the charging time, half the cost, half the parking space, 1/4th the traffic.
They require a different license and skill in my country. Not everyone can ride bikes unfortunately, especially for fear of accidents. Regardless if that fear is well founded or not.
Drive in dense traffic in a vehicle with effectively no crumple zones? Hard pass.
Climate change can’t kill you if everyone else does first
welcome to the arms race.
They don’t have much power and don’t go very fast.
the problem isn’t that these ones don’t, it’s that others do
Of course, but I guess this is also a problem with infrastructure. As a European, I think “Great, that’s way safer than a bicycle”. But the US isn’t a place for bicycles either and when you have to share the streets mainly with overpowered SUVs, then of course it’s getting exponentially more dangerous.
What you need is infrastructure that gives space to smaller transportation modes. This is something you need to resolve in politics. In Europe infrastructure for non-cars is a major campaign topic. Politicians care about it, because the public does. If you as voters don’t make it known that you need alternatives to cars, your infrastructure will never reflect that. Hold your politicians accountable and vote accordingly.
After getting stuck in traffic jams in both a giant land yacht 56 bel air and a tiny little 00 z3 crumple zone is kinda the least of my worries compared to getting cramps in my compact z3 my time in car centric Florida I was really begging to just have bench seats so I can at least stretch my legs inside my car
Half of these are literally a citroen ami with a different plastic shell
That doesn’t make it a less good vehicle for how most people use their vehicle every day.
there need to be taxes on larger vehicles where its .05% times the weight of the vehicle.
Were I live, you see them mostly in rural areas were public transport is scarce and you are basically stuck without a car. They have been proven to be a good alternative for seniors and young people that are not old enough for a full drivers licence (18).
I just had a conversation with my BIL, who told me that his company (a big tool manufacturer) and others in the area give them as some kind of signing bonus to new apprentices. They have recuting issues for a while and making young people mobile and independent from public transport seems to be effective.
In Japan there is something similar they have a class of cars called kei car and it is not as small but close and have limited engine size like under liter for combustion variant and some other rules that they have to comply and those are less taxed and much cheaper but what suprised me at least in cities i visited last year still majority of the cars there was the regular ones
I have looked it up on wiki and it looks amazing i would maybe own a car myself if we have something similar here in europe or maybe not because i live in old and small city and here you can go almost anywhere by walking https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kei_car
Taxation is a complicated thing, many different subsidies etc exist. I think here in general people are taxed higher % when getting a microcar than a big one. For sure if it’s the employer leasing a car for the employee which is a very common thing here.
Now that you say it, it’s been a while since I last saw a ‘smart ForTwo’…
…they stopped producing those in March this year?
I’m not really fond of microcars. Every time I see one I’m like: “Just buy a bike it’s cheaper and it doesn’t look like a motorized dumpster!”. Not to mention that to drive one in France you don’t even need a driving license. Talk about a security hazard… My thinking is they’re a lot pricier than great top of the line E-bikes (hydraulic breaks and the whole shebang), you can carry as much as a cargo bike and for the rain, a waterproof coat and pants work just fine (tropical regions get a pass I guess).
First of all it’s tiny and limited to 45km/h which is the top speed of an e-bike in the states. I don’t want to be hit by a microcar, but I’d hate to get hit by a loaded class 3 cargo bike either. And I’d far rather either of those than some obnoxious dually equipped pickup truck.
Second of all, some people don’t want to be out biking in inclement weather… Or even at all. And that’s OK.
Small light electric vehicles like ebikes or electric microcars are a great way to supplement gaps in good public transit and walkable cities. On top of that, unlike full size electric cars which reinforce car dependence, these types of vehicles encourage small, slow streets for cars in urban areas, mixed with bike, walking, and public transit infrastructure.
You’re right, these are very good arguments. I’m just too biased towards bikes, so I become overly critical of microcars. The two are complementary modes of transport, for sure. Still, a compulsory driving license for microcars should be standard around the world.
They do have a license requirement, it’s just not a full drivers license. At least for anyone born after 1987. Before that, these vehicles were meant to save rural widows from starvation so they really had no requirement except for insurance. Here is more info!
I know what you mean though, anything that looks like a car based solution always looks like a trap to encourage more car dependence.
Ah, the eternal dream of hew “pod”.
