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Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr
Considering those Japanese microcars that are not so great when it comes to the aerodynamics...........
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I went to a Ford employee presentation on the future of autonomous vehicles a while back, and they had a video showing how traffic may look/act and how this may influence architecture and pedestrian interaction as well as automobile design and terms of automobile use/ownership.
The thing which was intended to blow your mind was at the featured intersection how cars kept going but narrowly missed each other without slowing down.
Part of the reason they could do this was the single pod teardrop cars which looked like bananas on end or vertical teardrops similar to the design below (shorter targets).
https://www.pinterest.com/pin/195132596324848111/
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Designed by Woo-Ram Lee, Moville is a compact single passenger vehicle that comes in a tear drop shaped. The concept car features artificial intelligence and zero-emission drive train. It uses electromagnets to rotate the ball wheels.
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I think these smaller pod cars were supposed to be intercity driver-less taxis that never went on the highway. However they were possibly very aerodynamic, it was hard to tell in such a short video as they whizzed by.
I'm just saying that if you take out the steering wheel or even a joystick, you can pin the occupant in there like a coffin thereby reducing internal volume requirements and any issues with observability and blind spots as the vehicle drives it's self.