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The World's Cheapest Car Set To Launch
theodp writes "Ready for one-automobile-per-child (OAPC)? India's giant Tata Group is on the verge of launching the world's cheapest car. The People's Car, slated to be unveiled January 10th at a New Delhi auto show, will carry a sticker price of 100,000 rupees ($2,500), which some analysts say could revolutionize automobile costs worldwide. The Tata is a pet project of Cornell-trained architect Ratan Tata, who helped design it. The vehicle is aimed at improving driving safety by getting India's masses off their motorbikes and into cars."
The Germans came out with this people's car concept back in the 1930s,... Heck, that's pretty much a direct translation of the word, "Volkswagon!
Considering how poorly the not-even-as-low-cost Chinese cars perform in crash-tests, you've got to wonder how on earth something that cheap could possibly be safe at anything faster than walking speed.
For now, I'll hold on to my Peel P50.
-- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
From the summary (not even the article!):
The People's Car, slated to be unveiled January 10th at a New Delhi auto show, will carry a...
It's kind of hard for pictures to be available when it hasn't even been unveiled yet. Of course, I'm not even sure why an announcement of an announcement is news, but what can you do?
Having just got back from a 2 week business trip in India, where I got to ride around in Bangalore in traffic (in a Tata car no less), ... what the hell are these people thinking?
... yeah no conflict of interest here. Most of the guys I work with rode bikes to work, and stated their commutes would be about 33% longer if they took a car.
.... and build some more pedestrian bridges so the populace doesn't have to play human frogger all day long.
If you want to fix India traffic issues the solution is not to add MORE CARS. Infact, I would argue one should add more motorcycles to the traffic. The motorcycles are the only vehicles that get around easily in Indian traffic while the rest of the road is jammed up with giant trucks manufacturered by TATA
Real ideas for fixing Indian traffic issues and fatailities:
Purge the Indian traffic police and start over. From what I saw these guys are incredibly ineffective. They stand around and wave during rush hour. They have no power to change the flow of traffic or enforce laws due to the sheer mass and force of violations occuring. You don't get 1 guy running a red light in india, you get the whole damn contents of the Intersection.
Build a new agency from the ground up focused around safety and enforcement of laws, and start ENFORCING the traffic laws.
Increase traffic fines - now my judgement here may be skewed because the standard of living is lower in India and as a result these fines may be more to your average Indian, but check this out:
http://www.bcp.gov.in/english/trafficpolice/trafficdos/spotfines.htm
It's a list of "spot fines". Note that 40 rupees is about $1 USD.
Speeding? $7.50
Driving without a license? $7.50.
Running a red light? $2.50
Yeah - does anyone else wonder why these offenses continue to happen?
Study traffic calming techniques used in some european countries recently. The problem I see with the roads in India is they're built much like US roads - wide, big, with high curbs, and the sheer design of them encourages speeding. Parking problems in the city has made parking on lots of main roads illegal.
Get rid of the high curbs everywhere, put parked cars back onto the streets to provide a visual and mental barrier for pedestrian traffic, and make the roads "feel" dangerous (which really, if you dont think Indian traffic is dangerous already you dont have a pulse but whatetver...)
Get the giant ass Tata trucks off the roads. I don't know what the hell these Tata trucks do driving around all the time, but theyre huge flatbeds, bigger then everything else on the road, and look dangerous as hell.
Mass transit - finish the projects on time and ahead of schedule. Yeah, that means YOU Bangalore officials sitting on your asses getting kickbacks from the Metro project. Fix the shit.
Crosswalks/pedestrian bridges - Try painting some lines on the road once and a while
Get the wildlife off the roads - Now seriously, I respect the traditional farmers still left in the country and in the cities, but cows do NOT belong on roads, ok?!
The world needs something between:
a motorcycle, which has limited cargo capacity, limited passenger capacity, and a very limited safety profile when it gets in a wreck
and
a full, up-to-US-safety-specs car, which typically has a trunk, room for 4 or 5 people, and a good safety factor.
In America, this will require a change in the law. However, once the law allows less-safe vehicles, a whole market will open up for 2-seater, lightweight mini-cars that run rings around regular cars in fuel economy.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
So basically, you accuse America of acting selfishly to protect our position of "privilege". Do you have any idea, though, how arrogant it sounds to compare a country of more than a billion people to us in the 1930s? Get over it!
There's a big difference between ignorantly pushing technology forward when you don't know the consequences as opposed to pushing forward when you're well aware of what will happen. The BRIC nations can have a much more detrimental effect on the environment than America has ever had. It may not be fair, but guess what - that's life. It ain't fair. Deal.
If every motorcycle/two-wheeler in a city like Bombay was replaced by this car, traffic would grind to a complete halt. So, in that respect, this car would make the roads safer. You just wouldn't be able to get anywhere.