Cool videos: street lamp electric bubble car, Disney's 1958 hovering solar car
The video above is all about Ross Lovegrove's electric car that doubles as a street lamp. We wrote about the Ross' concept car, which is also solar powered and super lightweight, in a post about a Ted Talk he gave in June. If that's too realistic for you, below the fold is a video from a 1958 Disney TV show titled "Magic Highway USA" with wild visions of our automotive future.
Disney predicted that after the gas cars, "more efficient" gas turbine cars would become popular, then speedy jet cars, nuclear powered cars (why not?) and last but not least, solar powered hovering cars. A lot of the other ideas in the Disney video are wrong as well but several were spot on: like GPS maps in cars (except they thought punch cards would store the map data) and rearview TV instead of rearview mirrors.
I hope Disney is right about that hovering solar car. They look like fun.
[Source: YouTube]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Phil L. 7:55AM (11/29/2007)
In spite of some of the silliness in the “Magic Highway USA” video, some of what they got right is very interesting – and relevant today:
“…expanded highway transportation decentralizes our population centers into vast urban areas.”
“…the commuter’s radius will be extended many miles”
Of course, these statements then embedded hope that ignored the downsides of the reality that we're living with today.
An unspoken premise behind most of their view of the future: Massive amounts of energy will be cheap and readily available. Atomic tunneling? Miles of heated highways? No problem!
Yeah, the future isn’t turning out quite the way they thought it might…
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GoodCheer 2:17PM (11/29/2007)
Those were just the thoughts I had Phil L..
The images of each building on the future world isolated from all those around it, with a super-highway leading to the front door instead of a sidewalk. That seems all to close to the truth when I watch people drive from one side of the mall parking lot to the other to get two two stores at the same development.
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