In case you couldn’t tell, I’m hardly the biggest fan of the Insurance Institute For Highway Safety. Corporate-backed safety nannies posing as quasi-governmental bodies with an ends-justify-the-means vendetta against speed, light weight and other admirable car qualities just rub me the wrong way somehow. But the enemy of my enemy is my friend (for at least a legislative session or two), and it turns out the IIHS and I can agree on something to hate: Neighborhood Electric Vehicles. Now, you might think that limiting an entire class of cars to 25 MPH is something the IIHS would consider a good first step, but you’d be wrong. A Wall Street Journal piece on the rise of these annoying little vehicles quotes an IIHS spokesman calling NEVs “souped-up golf carts,” and warning of the safety consequences of allowing them on public roads. In fact, the IIHS is threatening to perform another round of its patented “no shit, Sherlock” crash tests, “proving” that NEVs aren’t capable of protecting passengers in a collision with a real car. Despite the pointlessness of this gesture, TTAC wholeheartedly embraces the idea of NEV crash testing, purely for entertainment and schadenfreude-related reasons. If the portion of the video above (showing what appears to be a Chrysler GEM NEV) is anything to go on, this could be epic. Meanwhile, our suggestion to eco-freak “early adopters” is to skip the NEVs and buy a motorcycle-category three wheeler. You’re still going to die in a crash, but at least we won’t get stuck behind you going 25 miles per hour. Check out TTAC’s review of the Miles ZX40 NEV here.
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You’re still going to die in a crash, but at least we won’t get stuck behind you going 25 miles per hour.
We probably will get stuck if they’re driving in Cambridge.
The “schadenfreude-related reason” is related to knowing that if this were a Ford Expedition plowing through an Aveo like the Germans going trough Poland, the conclusion would be that SUV’s are unsafe to little cars and their drivers and therefore must be re-designed/legislated out of existence. If IIHS were to stay true to form one of these vehicles will have to go or be re-engineered to the point of defeating its purpose for existence altogether.
This is my premise for all those upstart EV companies; that should tiny electric vehicles become the rage, how long will it be before the Saftey Czar spoils the party for everyone?
What we need is to throw this at a bloodthirsty investigative reporter from one of the TV or cable networks who wants to make a ‘difference’ (in ratings, in their careers etc. etc.) and watch a few P-C nannie state elitists eat their own.
Just for fun mind you.
The only true (see entertaining) test of safety would be a demolition derby. Pelosi, Frank, and Reid can drive the nev’s and 3 lucky winners can drive the suv of their choosing. It’s a reality tv goldmine… imagine the ratings.
They are Green in terms of no pollution and population control. Win/Win unless your driving it. I read they come from the factory with drainage holes in the floor for weight savings and to allow the blood to drain.
The most “environmentally friendly” electric vehicle (although still unsuitable for highway purposes) is the Zero S.
lightweight, 55mph top speed, about $10k (or less for off-road version), and the battery is so biodegradable, you can actually safely EAT IT (according to the manufacturer).
If you are going to buy a 3 wheeled vehicle you need a motorcycle license for anyhow, why not just get a motorcycle?
Robstar said: “… and the battery is so biodegradable, you can actually safely EAT IT (according to the manufacturer).”
Funny you should put it that way, by the looks of this video you just might have to. With the steering wheel, console and windscreen as an hor’dourve.
I don’t understand the hate here. As long as these vehicles keep to suburban streets where the speed limit is in their cruising speed, what’s the harm.
There’s an article in this month’s wired magazine about these vehicles and entire communities in FL built around them. Paths are built from the housing developments to various local shopping sites so that the owners never have to actually go on a real highway. Makes perfect sense and I wish more communities were planned that way. I haven’t reached the age where an NEV is necessary but it sure would be nice to be able to bicycle to the places I need to go without coming near an automobile.
At least on a scooter you don’t have to eat a steering wheel and windshield. I’ll take my chances on a motorcycle rather than one of these.
A head on between two of these would be enlightening, imagine a 50mph equivalent impact fusing the two cute cars together.
Sure, offer up the NEVs as sacrifice to the insurance gods. It will only make them hungrier for larger game.
Keep in mind that since coverage is mandatory, the end game is to be able to charge high premiums for large, expensive cars (you’ll die in anything less!) that go slow (speed cameras), be able to up the rate at the slightest pretense (red light cameras) and not pay out properly when needed (use of cheaper aftermarket parts, denial of claims due to mods, technicalities, etc.)
Having an enemy in common doesn’t quite make you friends.
mikedt said: “I don’t understand the hate here.” Respectfully, there’s no hate on my part, but there is cynicism. I don’t hate EV’s or Hybrids per se. The selfish motive that fuels ( no pun intended ) my cynicism is that EV’s and Hybrids are the protected species of the automotive kingdom. What, I wonder will IIHS actually do with the data that it just might be that the politically correct morally acceptable solution to America’s energy costs and shortages is unsafe to its users? Will these vehicles become as culturally toxic as SUV’s because of the high probablility of fatal injury in them? Will it be used to ensure that they are just as safe as their fossil fuel cousins? Or will we see (yet again) that IIHS uses saftey data as a canard for their own politically motivated agendas?
This makes the ’59 Chevy look pretty good.
Ligier is offering similar unsafe stuff in Europe (although w/o electric drive systems) (cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ligier ; http://www.lepori.de/). Kind of motorized wheelchairs. Can be driven without a driver’s license and a limited top speed of 25 km/h or 45 km/h).
Pretty dangerous stuff. Although they are not allowed on the Autobahn, it’s pretty embarrassing to have one ahead on country roads (even if you are expecting all kinds of slow-moving agricultural vehicles). If you are near enough to read the “25 km/h” sign they need to carry you better have good brakes or no oncoming traffic.
Remember Ligier anyone? They had a racing history once.
mikedt has a valid point. I don’t see the harm if they are operated within an environment where they don’t face interactions with normal vehicles. If developments are created with these in mind then so much the better.
Of course this doesn’t make the vehicles inherently safer, it only mitigates part of the potential risk.
I wonder what that steering wheel tastes green?
Is Tata Nano any better?
If you are going to buy a 3 wheeled vehicle you need a motorcycle license for anyhow, why not just get a motorcycle?
Not in CA at least.
I live in a town in New Jersey that is a suburb of New York City. Approximately 3300 people commute from my town to The Big Apple every business day on NJTransit. One of those commuters has, what the People’s Republic of New Jersey calls a “LSV.” That’s “Low Speed Vehicle” to NJ ecoweenies.
To everyone else, it’s a fiberglass golf cart with turnsignals, headlights, a horn, a roll bar and seat belts.
The owner of said vehicle, made a pitch to our town’s Deputy Mayor for Environmental Affairs. Yes, we have one. It’s a volunteer position. And in turn, the guy got THREE parking spaces at the train station. About three of these carts would fit in one space.
Now, on the other hand, we have at least 10 scooter riders in our town. Most of us have Vespas, a couple guys have Yamaha Vinos, and there’s a couple of peculiar Chinese scooters. Point being, our 200 pounds scooters made of mostly recyclable materials have NO designated parking spaces.
So, there’s an enormous amount of ignorance in the People’s Republic of New Jersey about electrical power. Here, about 20 percent of it comes from nukes, 70 percent from coal and the rest from natural gas.
So, every time I see this thing, I wonder, what’s more ecofriendly? My recyclable Piaggio Fly 150 or a fiberglass golf cart? And what about my motorcycle that gets 50 mpg, has a 200,000 mile service life and a 3-way catalyst in the exhaust system … is that more ecofriendly than a golf cart?
Time will tell. Or maybe not.
What wimps we have become. These things are at least as safe as the cars most of us grew up in. Do you really think this is worse than a 70s VW van?
Yes, these are stupid. I can imagine a “development” built around all these idiot contraptions – this, the segway, the electric unicycle. Lock them all behind a fence an’ let them geek it out. Would look something like the Island of Misfit Toys.
Meanwhile, give scooters and bicyles better infrastructure in the normal world.
Terms such as “Why the hate”, “I don’t understand the hate”, “Lots of hate here” are not helpful unless the comment is being made to chill the conversation.
Maybe I wouldn’t feel the hate of hate so much if the word were defined. In the context of this article, that is.
“Hate?” What hate? Why use such a strong word so freely, when the evidence doesn’t necessarily point to hate, but instead to a reasoned dislike, caution, apprehension, or even fear-of-sudden-irreversable-liquification? It should be understood that I hate hate as much as anybody, but I espcially hate hate of hate. Even moreso when it is expressed as hate of haters who really are not haters.
Got that? Good!
To coin a turn of phrase, I don’t understand all of the hate of hate here. Which is worse, the original “hate” or the hate of the hate that might not really be hate (or at least not hateful hate) after all?
Back on topic for a moment. After due consideration, I’ve decided that I’d “hate” to be caught dead in one of those little sardine cans. And it seems to me that this is a very real possibility. 40MPH is easiliy achieved even on busy city streets. Pow! Man, I’d “hate” to make the cleanup crew resort to tweezers, eyedroppers, and sponges to extricate all of my pieces/parts…
I suppose I am capable of hate after all. I apologize for all the hate and I’m sorry for the bother!
p.s. I also hate brussel sprouts and chickpeas. I thought It would be best to just get that off my chest right away.
These tiny EV cars are still as safe or more than a motorcycle and we are allowed to ride them – for now.
If the Zenn’s top speed is 35 mph and the speed limit is 35 mph then who is stuck behind who here? Looks like the Zenn is not holding up anyone. Now if some Zenn driver took to the highway then yes i could see getting a little anxious over the delay. Actually last summer I followed a GEM down a section of rural 55 mph two-lane road. He had about a dozen cars stacked up behind him but every once in a while he’d pull over, endure the dirty looks, let everyone pass him and get back into traffic. No thanks… However a different route to the same destination would have given him all roads with a 35 mph speed limit so I don’t understand why he went that way.
I’d really LIKE to see about a thousand of these running around our small town where they are perfectly capable of running normal in-town speeds. Less pollution. Less exhaust fumes. More gasoline for me to burn in my 70s VW van – which I might add would slaughter alot of modern vehicles with the front end. It was the 60s vans that were really scary. The 80s vans were even better.
http://www.youtube.com/user/G00G00L
There is a time and place for these micro-cars. I hope the gov’t doesn’t step in and “save us from ourselves”. Its none of their business. I’ll decide what risks I’ll take with my life thanks. Still safer than on my motorcycle which goes ALOT faster.
The point of the IIHS tests is to show what happens when some small cars are crashed at 40 mph. At least we know what we can expect if driving one of these.
BTW, light cars can offer safety in crashes. Smart and other small cars do reasonably well.
IIHS also crashed a ’59 Chevrolet against a 2009 Chevrolet. On impact, the ’59 virtually disintegrated, while the 2009 stayed relatively intact.
p.s. I also hate brussel sprouts and chickpeas. I thought It would be best to just get that off my chest right away.
Philistine. Cruciferous vegetables taste great and are really good for your health. As for chickpeas/garbonzos, Mollie Katzen has a killer recipe for spicy hummous in one of her veggie cookbooks. Chickpeas are pretty high in protein. The kosher pizza shop nearby makes a great felafel calzone.
Now raw onions are truly a pox upon humanity (with the exceptions of gazpacho and coneys/chili dogs).
If the economy ever booms again and TTAC goes public, panzerfaust should be 1st in line for stock options based on comment acidity.
re: mikedt:
I don’t understand the hate here. As long as these vehicles keep to suburban streets where the speed limit is in their cruising speed, what’s the harm.
These vehicles are being crashed at neighborhood speeds (actually much slower than the speeds that assholes drive through my neighborhood at).
These things are being crashed at 40 KILOMETERS per hour, which is only 24 MILES per hour.
I have no idea why the IIHS is using kmh instead of mph, maybe advocating the metric system is its latest agenda.
Don’t they usually crash test vehicles into “soft” objects instead of unmovable solid barriers?
Stuff with padding enough to represent the crumple zones of another car?
Am wondering if somebody at the IIHS is trying very hard to make these cars look worse than they are – you know scare us into staying in our domestically produced 5,000 lb SUVs.
I can hear the easily influenced consumers now – “oh my goodness, these cars are so unsafe!!!” Its the same group that was successfully worried right into huge vehicles so they would be “safer” from other motorists.
Okay – just don’t hit anything. Same mindset I have when I ride my motorcycle or bicycle or in fact even when I drive my much more substantial daily drivers.
I thought my comments were more on the Alkaline side. But I’m in counseling, so they may be leaning toward Lithium any day now.
Wonder how many folks run off the road and hit unmovable objects at 35 mph vs other vehicles at 35 mph.
I’m guessing that most drivers – except the worst drivers – are aware of their surroundings enough to avoid things like trees, walls, poles, houses, and loading docks. If they aren’t – is there any car that better suits them than a car limited to 35 mph???
NEVs might be the perfect vehicle for the excessively risky drivers, old, very young, etc. Keeps a person in touch with their lack of immortality. VBG!