In the streets of Castelnau-Pégayrols, a small village of 350 inhabitants located in the heights of Millau (Aveyron), the “critter” is now part of the decor.
The “critter” is the nickname given to Michel and Hélène Jacquemin’s “veloto”, a pedal car created with the help of a manufacturer.
More than ten years ago, despite the 20 km and 600 m difference in altitude that separate him from Millau, Michel abandoned his car, which he considered to be an “ecological absurdity”.
He first turned to the electric bike: “I started by electrifying my bike, and I tried to convince my loved ones to do the same.
But they had four counter-arguments: safety from cars on the road, weather, travel time, and lack of space for their shopping or to transport their children.
This now retired carpenter is trying to find “the missing link” between the electric bike and the car.
In November 2019, the couple then contacted the company QBX, based in Carcassonne and specializing in the design of intermediate vehicles, a category including all vehicles between the car and the electric bicycle (cargo bikes, electric carts without a license, etc. .).
“A week later, the boss called us back to tell us that the project was underway,” recalls Hélène.
Three prototypes will then be released, including one which will be delivered to the Aveyron couple, so that they can experiment with it.
Since then, they have become “addicts”: “I have sensations that I no longer had in the car, like the smell of flowers or the sound of birds,” says Hélène.
A lack of public transport
This idea mainly came from the lack of public transport from which the village suffers.
Only a school bus connects it to Millau, the nearest large town.
From Millau, only two daily trains go to Montpellier, via Béziers.
“Without a car, we have no solution for getting around other than at the convenience of our neighbors,” complains Hélène.
The car is not a choice, it is a constraint that weighs heavily on the purchasing power of rural households.
» And as proof, with €0.50 of electricity consumption per 100 km, Hélène saw her energy bill drop by 200 euros during the first month of using the beast, compared to her gasoline expenses.
To fill this gap and expand their circle of fans, the couple founded In'VD 5 years ago, an association whose objective is to promote intermediate vehicles in rural areas.
Thanks to subsidies, it now makes cars without electric licenses available for 20 euros per week.
An initiative which even convinced the Occitanie region to grant them a grant of 70,000 euros to create a kit, which would allow companies, municipalities or associations to go car-free this week almost everywhere in France.
Also read: Why do cyclists ride on the road when there is a cycle path right next to it?
Their experimentation with the “bug” is also yielding results: thanks to their feedback, the manufacturer QBX will market, in 2025, an improved version of their pedal car, which will be called the “Sorean”.
The price should be around 10,000 euros.
“For the moment, they are expensive because they are manufactured individually, but when they are manufactured industrially, their price will drop significantly and we will have an approach that is both ecological and economical,” Michel wants to believe.