News in Brief

25th November 2007

Two-seat ‘trolley’ top of the shops
Here’s a small car that really can be described as a supermarket trolley! The two-seat electric City Car is designed to collapse and stack like a shopping cart, so up to eight can fit in a normal parking space. It’s a design project at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, with a business model similar to bike-share programs – using kiosks where you can pick one up or drop one off.

Foreign drivers’ crash risk shock
Motorists from abroad cause 18,000 accidents every year, says the Association of British Insurers. It blames the figures on increased driving between countries and a rise in motorists coming from the Continent. The ABI added that European HGVs are three times more likely to have a crash than UK trucks – although it noted that Brits travelling on the other side of the Channel were involved in more than 5,000 accidents in 2006.