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| India's Bajaj Qute just sips fuel, but is not selling fast in South Africa, where big vehicles rule. |
ON average, a car carries only 1,2 people for only 35 km on a daily journey. This means normal cars are too big for 95% of their usage, and that 95% of our road space is wasted. Engineers hate waste, hence they keep designing efficient little microcars in the hope drivers will see “cents” instead of the lure of a big doublecabs or SUVs. Seen here are three such cars. LEFT is the Bajaj Qute from India, which listed in SA since 2017 for R75 K. It sold so slowly that the Bajaj SA Facebook page now lists
the Qute for R68 999. Prince Pirikisi, a taxi operator who in 2018 bought ten Qutes to operate his Emergency Taxi service in Sandton and Melville in Johannesburg, told the
Weekly Mail and Guardian the 0,217-litre engine gets 2,8l/100 km, making it as light as a scooter. The Qute can also run on compressed natural gas (CNG), which Pirikisi said is cheaper than petrol.
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| The Swiss family Ouboter, dad Wim and sons Oliver and Merlin, are all about efficient commuting. |
CENTRE: Running not on fossil fuels but electric currents is the Microlino, from Swiss family Ouboter. Dad Wim invented the first kickscooter in 1999 and sold 80 000 a day in the first year. He has since been joined by his sons Oliver and Merlin (center) to design the Micrlino — a modern take on the Isetta. Designed in Italy by electric car specialists Tazzari, production of the Microlino will start next year in China to deliver the 16 000 orders received since the prototype Microlino was shown at the Geneva Auto Show in 2016. The Microlino sells for base price of €12 000 (over R204 000) — twice as much as the Ami, which Citroën launched in Paris last week.
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| Citroën's two-seater microcar is all about savings. |
Citroën’s engineers designed the Ami only with savings in mind. For example, it has only ony door shape instead of a left and a right door, which is why the doors open as they do in the photo above; and why Citroën can sell this two-seater microcar for €6,000 (over R101 000). Drivers can also rent the Ami for about R40 a month and like Renault, Citroën plans a car sharing fleet, which does not aim to sell cars, but Transport as a Service (TaaS), with subscribers typically paying about R4/minute. Registered as a quadricycle, the Ami can be driven by 14-year-old teenagers without a licence.
