Slimline tonic
'Narrow cars' have already attracted the attention of Hollywood celebrities. But some leading engineers believe they have a future in the wider market. Helen Knight reports.
Early next month film star George Clooney will take delivery of a new high-performance car with sporting pretensions. The $85,000 (£45,000) carbon-fibre two-seater is capable of doing 0-60 in four seconds, and has over 1,000ft-lb of torque at its disposal.
Clooney is believed to want to use the car, built by UK automotive technology and motorsport specialist Prodrive for US firm Commuter Cars, for daily trips between his home and the set of his latest movie.
But surely there's nothing particularly unusual in a Hollywood star buying a sports car? Indeed, a cursory glance at the particulars of Clooney's new vehicle, the Tango, suggests that it wouldn't be out of place alongside the Porsches and Ferraris in any A-list celebrity's garage.
But surprisingly for such a high-performance car, the Tango is an electric vehicle. And more surprisingly still, it is just 2.6m long and 1m wide, narrow enough to take up half the width of a normal driving lane. A Smart car is 1.5m wide.
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