Et si l'avenir de la voiture, c'était un truc carré, sans avant et sans arrière et surtout sans volant, c'est à dire tout le contraire de ce qu'elle est aujourd'hui ?
C'est en tout cas ce que laisse penser le concept d'Autonomobile imaginé pour les années 2040 par l'agence de design basée à San Francisco, Mike + Maaike.
Explications du projet "Speed has been the driving factor for car design, styling, and engineering for a century. Most vehicles on the road today are capable of reaching 120 mph yet they are mostly used at moderate speeds and sitting in traffic. It’s time to look at performance in a new way. Our vision is a new focus on quality of time while in traffic and transit. Dismissing the need for extreme MPH and acceleration as irrelevant, performance can be measured by time savings instead."
"From the outside, ATNMBL looks like micro-architecture. Large windows, a pitched roof and asymmetrical from every view, it is designed without any reference to automobiles of the past. In contrast to today’s automobiles, where much of the car’s space is reserved for engine and drive train, ATNMBL’s mechanical components are densely packed and simplified, providing dramatically more interior space in a vehicle that is shorter than most cars on the road today."
Et concernant l'absence de volant, la réponse est là : "Driverless cars, once a fantasy requiring new roads and infrastructure, are now technologically possible, even inevitable. GPS, sophisticated sensors, and navigation databases will allow driverless vehicles to operate on the same roads we have today."
A noter que sur ce genre de sujet les Japonais avaient là-encore pris beaucoup d'avance depuis plusieurs années (voir notamment là)