Enlarge image
Two doors, two seats: a city car as it should be
Photo: Hannelore Foerster / Getty Images
The Smart is this 2.70 meter long two-seater that somehow fits into every parking space.
How convenient.
But now the tiny one is mutating into a city SUV. "As an SUV, it is finally growing up," says Mercedes design chief Gorden Wagener. In the Daimler logic, this obviously means getting bigger. The Smart will be a five-seater, more than four meters long, a successor to the two-seater is not planned. "Sweet was yesterday, now the Smart is sexy," says Wagener.
But unfortunately the Smart misses the point.
Because even if it may be hard to imagine for the design departments of the car manufacturers, beyond collectibles and super sports cars, a car - whether 2.7 meter long two-seater or an over four meter long SUV - is as sexy as a pasta strainer.
It is a mass-produced, interchangeable commodity that, just like the pasta infuser, at best gains emotional value through the memories associated with it.
The thing has to work and fit in a drawer or parking space, that's it.
From clever to 08/15
That's what the Smart stood for - even with its name.
According to the Duden dictionary, smart means clever.
As a two-seater, he always kept this promise.
He embodied the principle of the car in a refreshingly new way, was a vehicle for the cities and thus reversed a way of thinking: the city does not have to match the car, but the car with the city.
The Smart was a good exception in an industry that already sells enough unnecessary items.
In times when the car competes with the bicycle for every meter of road space and there is a tough fight for traffic space, the Smart was a signal that there was a different, more efficient way of doing things.
That fewer and fewer cars fit on twenty meters of parking lanes, but more.
And that there is a car that depicts reality: in fact, there are only 1.5 people on average in each car - and they are much more sensible to be accommodated in a 2.70 meter long vehicle than in an SUV over four meters long.
There are already enough of them, they form the largest market segment.
Virtually every brand has one on offer.
If Daimler means it honestly with the new Smart, the company should rename the brand to 08/15.
Even with an electric drive, an SUV does not become a city car
The electric drive doesn't change that either. An SUV over four meters long remains a tin colossus over four meters long, even with a battery drive. With an average of 1.5 occupants, it wastes just as much space as an identical combustion engine. It does make a contribution to the turnaround. What we urgently need, however, is a turnaround in traffic. The future will require better alternatives to automobiles - and cars that match user behavior.
The Smart was (and still is for a while) the drivable proof that you could buy a car that fits into the everyday life of many people - instead of buying a car that fits every imaginable, however rare, situation.
He reminded that even when buying a car, exceptions should be treated for what they are: exceptions for which there are taxis or rental cars.
Keyword transport of the in-laws or the rare trip to the furniture store.
Who buys a dispenser to invite twelve friends to a beer festival once a year?
Of course, the main problem with the two-seater Smart cannot be overlooked: it was a commercial flop.
However, that was only partly due to the format - the car was simply too expensive.
For the price of the Smart, other manufacturers have a small car with four seats.
However, Daimler could have tackled this problem with the new Smart. The new model is created in cooperation with the Chinese Geely group, which also builds it. With a lower price and an electronic premium of 9,000 euros, the Smart could also have been economical, what it was in terms of format: the cleverest variant.
