BMW Megacity Electric Car

[autogyro]

Sorry I thought the 65 was distance.
Unfortunately most of America was designed for personal vehicle transport and is unlike Europe which is mostly based on medieval or earlier planning.
It is far more difficult to reduce personal energy use in America because of this.
Problem here is finding space for everybody.
I also found push bikes a drag. Ok if you happen to be young and healthy, not much good when you find youself 10 miles from home and tired out.
My suggestion would be an electric bike, riden for exercise yes but with the ability to get home without effort and carry a reasonable load.

[flynfrog]

Sorry I thought the 65 was distance.
Unfortunately most of America was designed for personal vehicle transport and is unlike Europe which is mostly based on medieval or earlier planning.
It is far more difficult to reduce personal energy use in America because of this.
Problem here is finding space for everybody.
I also found push bikes a drag. Ok if you happen to be young and healthy, not much good when you find youself 10 miles from home and tired out.
My suggestion would be an electric bike, riden for exercise yes but with the ability to get home without effort and carry a reasonable load.

ill take my car it keeps me dry in the rain. I can also travel with a friend and car pool with it. An electric bike would be great if I lived a few blocks from work. The way my city is laid out it doesn't make much sense for my day to day travels. I do ride the motorcycle when I can but My guess is the amount of tires and batteries and expensive Austrian parts it has an appetite for far out weigh its gas savings.

[machin]

@ machin. I'm all for cycling but there are a few serious drawbacks.....

My experiences are slightly different:

In the mornings I take it very easy on the bike... my heart rate never goes up above what it would for a brisk walk, so I don't get hot and sweaty...

I arrive more awake than when I used to drive...

Most companies in the UK have cycle storage areas, infact there is a government funded scheme called "cycle to work" whereby you can buy a bike out of your wages before the tax is taken off.

It is quicker and easier to get into the town centre after work on the bike and lock it up somewhere infront of the shops, rather than getting in your car, fighting through the traffic to a parking area and then walk to the shops...

To make it completely safe I agree you'd have to ban "heavyweight" cars and vehicles in town centres (at least between certain times of the day....)

I was thinking about say a two seat "vehicle" which has electric drive augmentation... 30mph top speed, a small area for shopping bags... would work a treat.

A little bit of rain never hurt anybody!

[autogyro]

I think the main problem is the accepted methods of transport, fuzed into the social structure.
Status is everything and the type of vehicle used establishes the driver at a level of importance within society.
Anyone who studies this soon realises that it is an illusion produced by the greed system we are all forced to live under.
It is true that the 'green lobby' has established a counter social responsibility that includes a different level of accepted resource use.
This very often goes way over the top and makes life uncomfortable for many.
Unfortunately the two camps are at present wasting time in moral conflict, when they should be using common sense to improve things for us all.

[xpensive]

In the not too distant future, we will see vehicles, either powered by EM's fuelled by breeders, or through direct steam-turbine drive,
making energy access virtually endless.

[xpensive]

A gas xplotion in a Siberian coal-mine yesterday, so far 11 found dead and 60 missing. Did barely make the first page in Sweden, can anyone imagine the media's reaction if this had been an accident in a nuclear power-plant?

[autogyro]

A gas xplotion in a Siberian coal-mine yesterday, so far 11 found dead and 60 missing. Did barely make the first page in Sweden, can anyone imagine the media's reaction if this had been an accident in a nuclear power-plant?

Eh, so why would that be then?

[xpensive]

Because of the emotional structure built up around what we do not understand, a gas-xplotion yes, radioactivity, naah...

[autogyro]

Because of the emotional structure built up around what we do not understand, a gas-xplotion yes, radioactivity, naah...

So you would be prepared to guarantee in writing, that no accident in any nuclear reactor has any chance whatsoever of effecting the health of any of my family?

[xpensive]

When I'm an engineer Auto, you will never lure me there, you know as well as I do there are no guarantees in life whatsoever.
Like an underwater crude-oil xplotion in the gulf, an earthquake in Haiti or a Tsunami hitting Thailand.

[jon-mullen]

First pics of the monococque afaik.





Suicide doors?

[xpensive]

Don't get it, monocoque of what?

[jon-mullen]

A very tiny nuclear power plant.

The BMW Megacity concept, the one the thread was originally about.

[Just_a_fan]

Suicide doors?

Only if they leave them off!

Seriously, the hinges are at the front of the door opening aren't they?

[jon-mullen]

Yeah, I guess you're right, although there is a line in this pic that looks like it could be where two doors meet.