The Hiriko is a folding two-seat urban electric car being
developed by the Hiriko Driving Mobility consortium in the Basque Country. The
electric car is the commercial implementation of the CityCar project developed
by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab since 2003. The name
Hiriko comes from the Basque word for "urban" or "from the
city".
Three versions are being developed: the Fold microcar; the
Alai, a convertible; and the Laga, a small truck. The Hiriko is designed
specifically for short-distance urban carsharing programs and municipal fleets.
A manufacturing trial of 20 pre-production cars began in Vitoria-Gasteiz,
Spain, in July 2012.A pilot program is scheduled to take place in Germany in
2013 to integrate the Hiriko Fold into Deutsche Bahn's railway service to allow
their customers the possibility of using a vehicle parked at the station with
which to complete the last mile of the journey to their final destinations.
The production version of the Hiriko Fold is scheduled to be
unveiled in March 2013 at the Geneva Motor Show, and production is planned for
the second quarter of 2013. Retail deliveries are scheduled to begin in 2014,
and pricing starts at €12,500 (US$16,400) plus battery leasing fees
As our city centers become more and
more populated, new transportation ideas are being developed to keep the
population moving. The Hiriko Fold city car is an ultra-compact car that can fold upright to fit into
tight parking situations – and it’s set to hit the market next year in cities
around the world! Created by DENOKINN
and MIT’s Changing Places group, the high-tech vehicle is expected to cost $16,000, gets 75
miles between charges, and features spinning wheels that allow it to move
sideways, making parallel parking a snap
At just five feet long, the Hiriko Fold is smaller than the Smart Fortwo and is
capable of folding to fit into tight parking situations. The electric city car has room for two passengers (who enter the car from the
front) and it’s capable of driving up to 75 miles between charges. One cool
feature relates to the Hiriko Fold’s wheels, which have a zero-turn radius that
enables the vehicle to spin completely in place on its axis. This also gives
the small car the ability to move sideways, which aides in parallel parking.
Earlier this year the Hiriko project released the first initial sketches of its electric city
car, but at the end of June, the Fold was brought to the center of
Vitoria-Gasteiz, in the Plaza de la Virgen Blanca square. Twenty vehicles have
already been produced in the model’s initial trial production run. Some of
those initial models have now been sent to potential buyers in Europe for
testing. The group says that the city car has already passed all crash safety
tests. Eventually, three versions of the city car will be produced – the Fold;
the Alai, a convertible; and the Laga, a small truck.
The Hiriko Fold is expected to go on sale in 2013 with a price tag around
$16,000. The group expects to sell the small car in cities like Barcelona,
Berlin and San Francisco.
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