Project P.U.M.A.
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We've always been intrigued by the EN-V autonomous pod cars proposed by General Motors. Maybe they harken back to the happy futurism of the Fifties, or maybe it's just that they're the first total reinvention of wheeled personal transit in quite a while that makes inherent sense. Prototyped more than two years ago under the name Project PUMA (for Personal Urban Mobility and Accessibility), the EN-V was officially launched in Shanghai early last year. Urban, electric, autonomous The little pods use a lithium-ion battery pack powering one or more electric motors to carry one or two people up to...
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Video: GM's Two-Seat Autonomous Electric EN-V Spins Into ActionTo comply with upcoming gas mileage rules, automakers will launch appealing and economical compact or subcompact cars in the U.S. market over the coming years. But car designers are thinking far smaller yet. At the 2010 Los Angeles Auto Show two weeks ago, General Motors showed off an operating...
John Voelcker -
Why Not Run Your Electric Car Via Your iPad? We'll Tell You Why
Sometimes it's hard to keep track of small electric-vehicle companies, most of whom are likely to vanish without a trace within a few years. But T3 Motion, an EV startup in Costa Mesa, California, has a gimmick: It uses an Apple iPad to provide driver and passengers with audio, video, games, and...
John Voelcker -
GM's Future City-Car Vision: Autonomous, Electric, Two-Wheeler
What does personal transportation look like in a new century, when more than 60 percent of the world's citizens live in cities and the number of vehicles on the globe could rise to 2 billion? Would future urbanites accept the idea of moving around in pod-shaped electric two-seaters with only two...
John Voelcker
