City Car
The City Car is a stackable!! (emphasis mine) electric two-passenger city vehicle. The one-way sharable user model is designed to be used in dense urban areas. Vehicle Stacks will be placed throughout the city to create an urban transportation network that takes advantage of existing infrastructure such as subway and bus lines. By placing stacks in urban spaces and key points of convergence, the vehicle allows the citizens the flexibility to combine mass transit effectively with individualized mobility. The stack receives incoming vehicles and electrically charges them. Similar to luggage carts at the airport, users simply take the first fully charged vehicle at the front of the stack. The City car is NOT a replacement for personal vehicles, taxis, buses, or trucks; it is a NEW vehicle type that promotes a socially responsible and more effective means of urban mobility.
The City Car is a stackable!! (emphasis mine) electric two-passenger city vehicle. The one-way sharable user model is designed to be used in dense urban areas. Vehicle Stacks will be placed throughout the city to create an urban transportation network that takes advantage of existing infrastructure such as subway and bus lines. By placing stacks in urban spaces and key points of convergence, the vehicle allows the citizens the flexibility to combine mass transit effectively with individualized mobility. The stack receives incoming vehicles and electrically charges them. Similar to luggage carts at the airport, users simply take the first fully charged vehicle at the front of the stack. The City car is NOT a replacement for personal vehicles, taxis, buses, or trucks; it is a NEW vehicle type that promotes a socially responsible and more effective means of urban mobility.
The City car utilizes fully integrated in-wheel electric motors and suspension systems called, "Wheel Robots." The wheel robots eliminate the need traditional drive train configurations like engine blocks, gear boxes, and differentials because they are self-contained, digitally controlled, and reconfigurable. Additionally, the wheel robot provides all wheel power and steering capable of 360 degrees of movement, thus allowing for Omni-directional movement. The vehicle can maneuver in tight urban spaces and park by sideways translation. This technology is patented-pending and under design development at the MIT Media Lab.
(from cities.media.mit.edu)
The MIT Media Lab is way cool. They have so many funky innovations in the works. All this is from the Nov 19 issue of Time. And anyone who has that, please read page 56. It is H-I-L-A-R-I-O-U-S. One of the best-written pieces i have read in a long while. (and DON'T say i haven't been reading. i will just cry.)
* The Malay guys in the room next door are studying their Chinese very diligently. and reading very loudly. and singing 'peng you' very loudly. and now reciting "chuang qian ming yue guang..." i thnk they should have booked a ktv room instead ;)
2 条评论:
wow that's interesting. the car. singapore really needs some affordable space-friendly driving solutions soon. i've thought of signing up for the car coop thing (honda's hybrid car sharing scheme) but i don't know if it'll make sense financially. heh.
france has these cool smartcars that are tiny and can be parallel parked extremely easily. we love them. but this sounds even cooler!!
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