Fiat mulls 73mph limit for 500, Panda city cars

Fiat CEO Olivier François said he would "happily" limit the top speed of his company's city cars to 73mph, as an alternative to fitting them with costly safety technology that he considers unnecessary for low-speed driving.

He said that most of the ADAS technology that is mandated by current EU regulations is designed to improve safety at higher speeds so has little relevance for cars like the 500, Panda and Grande Panda, which are mainly driven around town.

Fitting this equipment is therefore unnecessarily hiking up the price of such models for little benefit to the consumer - and François thinks capping their top speed could be a more cost-effective answer.

It wouldn't be a particularly severe limit in relative terms, because none of those models is officially capable of cracking 100mph, and the Grande Panda EV is restricted to 82mph.

François welcomed the EU's proposals for a new 'M1E' category for small cars, because it demonstrates a recognition that the unilaterally imposed safety rules aren't appropriate in all segments.

"We fundamentally think that with all these rules, the most unsustainable portion lies in the city cars and urban driving, because all these cars are small, democratic and inexpensive, bought by younger people and so on for the daily commute in a city," said François. "They are driven at way slower speeds. It's not the same usage.

"I have a hard time understanding why we need to install all this super-expensive hardware: sensors, cameras, road sign recognition... All this is a little bit inadequate, a bit crazy, and has contributed to raising the average price of a city car by 60% over the last five or six years.

"I don't think that city cars in 2018 or 2019 were extremely dangerous. Our proposal was literally to say 'let's go a little bit backward from overloading cars with expensive hardware'."

For this reason, said François, Fiat "could consider lowering the maximum speed" of some of its cars.

"If you take the average legal maximum speed in Europe, it's 118kph [73mph], so above 118kph is [often] illegal, and most of the radars, ADAS and all this stuff has been developed for cars to go way above the speed limit.

"I would happily limit my city cars, my smaller cars, to what is today the maximum legal speed limit. It's already a limitation. There is something weird that I need to over-spec my cars to go above the legal speed limit."

If Fiat were to impose a blanket speed restriction across its line-up, it would be following in the footsteps of Volvo, which in 2020 capped all of its models at 112mph as part of a push to reduce fatal accidents in its cars to zero.

"A Fiat won’t go 73 mph for long. In fact, a Fiat won’t go for long."

Oh yes they will. I'm an American currently living in Italy. I drive a mid-90s Fiat Cinquecento (500). At one point I wrenched for a living, so I know cars, and know them inside and out.

I've driven everything from Buicks to Fords to Chevys to Jags to Caddies as well as some nice classic cars. Straight up, my Fiat's the most reliable and best engineered car I've owned. Barebones, simple, rock-solid and reliable, incredibly easy to work on. Parts for it are ridiculously cheap. Example: Several years back I completely rebuilt the front end. New control arms, ball joints, tie rod ends, dust bellows for the rack and new, hi-po struts. My cost for parts? Less than $220. My labor was about four hours - without using an impact gun. The original front end parts had lasted ~ 25 years.

The car is a basic one, little 900cc throttle body injected engine that moves it just fine. Five on the floor, power brakes and that's about it. It had 40K on the clock when I bought it~ 12 years ago. Has 160K now. Not a single breakdown and has never stranded me. The old 500s, 600s and Pandas are all over Southern Italy. Most look great and run great and folks keep them forever. And they're perfect for the narrow streets in the old medieval villages.

And BTW, mine does 80mph with more left!

“Texarkana to El Paso...”

You can’t be serious have you ever seen a Fiat 500 ?

First off you cannot even get a Fiat 500 here in the states it’s not in production and it’s smaller than any other car allowed for sale here.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiat_500_(2007)

This is what is being debated in limiting speeds so they don’t have to add in all that mandatory automated stopping, braking and collision avoidance cameras, radar and lidar too. Plus tech to read speed signs and limit it to 10-20km over by EU mandate

This is the last version you could get here it’s a two.door city car nothing more. It barely met US safety ratings and that had to add 600lbs of weight and body structure to do that making it even more dog slow. No on NO ONE is going to take one of these in a Texas motorway with articulated trailers on them.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiat_500e

These cars were designed for Italian city streets that are 2000+ years old in layout , width and curves. Some are still the original cobble stones from the Romans at that. Have you ever been to Rome or Naples those streets were made for horses and carts even tiny cars like this struggle to do 40 km/h there is a reason everyone rides Vespa it’s the best mode in dense medieval type cities. The two other models the same size or the Grand Panda is still an A class only 4 doors size none of them is going on a motorway that is not their job. There is a reason all 3 are EVs, with optional as hybrids they are city cars by design. None of them are over 2600in curb weight that’s 2/3 of a class C which is what the smallest sedans are here. My model 3 is 3900lbs and it’s lighter than the S60 Volvo it replaced. Both are not large cars they would be compacts if you rented them. Maybe an intermediate size.

Italy has a fine high speed rail.network the EVO is world class you don’t drive your vespa or 500 from Rome to Milan you take the 250+ km/h EVO and rent a vespa in Milan.

The EU has specific.licencing for sub A class cars the light and heavy quadracycle kind. Young people can drive them before they test for and are old enough for the class B. Quads are already limited by speed limiter and horsepower limits too.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quadricycle_(EU_vehicle_classification)

It’s like tell the class you have never been to Italy without saying it. No one is going to cry if there tiny class A cuts out at 72mph when you are lucky to do 25 even with zero traffic in the cities.

For the class. This is Italy being debated not the USA specifically for not having to add in all that mandatory tech for high speed driving and extra structural weight for crash tests.

Here are the actual speed limits by road type in Italy.

Notice only the Autostrade have a limit over 70mph. These limits are rigorously enforced with license plate reading speed cameras called Safety Tutors they issue citations and take points off the licence automatically get too many points off and it’s revoked. Every Autistrade is also a toll road and not cheap at all in addition to the vignette needed to drive on the private owned roads.

It should also be pointed out that some of the most popular cars EVER made by total number sold in Europe had top speeds under 70 mph.

The original Type 1 VW Beatle sold millions and struggled to get past 70 on level ground and due to its design the front end lifted at 60+ and was scary to drive above 65. Had a red ‘69 super Beatle took it once on a US interstate never twice. The Type 1 Beatle sold for 65 years and 21+ million copies in this slow form. It’s the most produced and popular car in all of human history.

The hippie van,the VW Type 2 also sold by the millions had a top speed floored and screaming of 60-70 mph depending on year and engine cc this too sold 19 million copies across it’s production run.

The French would like to enter the chat. Citroën 2CV’s top speed varied by year and engine (375cc): Around 40 mph (64 km/h). Later Models (602cc): Closer to 69-71 mph (111-115 km/h).

Citroën sold over 5.1 million 2CVs (including sedan and van versions) between 1948 and 1990, with figures around 3.8-3.9 million for the core sedan model alone, making it one of the best-selling cars ever, spawning popular derivatives like the Ami, Dyane, and Méhari that add to the platform’s total of over 9 million vehicles.

Yeah not one of those above 9 million could go faster that 60-70mph maxed out and when you run a vehicle like that for any length of time you break things fast.

Oh and let’s not forget this is about a Italian minicar the original Fiat 500 so named for it’s 497cc engine.

Classic Fiat 497cc / 500cc (approx. 1957–1975)

Top Speed: Approximately 54–60 mph (87–96 km/h).

Here again millions sold. No one blinked why because these are city cars for European cities designed and built multiple hundreds to thousands of years before the auto existed. Horse and carts designed streets. You are lucky to hit 40km/h let alone the limits of 50 and most real urban areas are 30km/h or ZTL anyways.

Pay particular attention to the urban speed limits below those apply to every street inside the muni boundary and every city CBD has the lower 30 km/limits

Italy loves ZTLs (Zona a Traffico Limitato over 350 Italian cities have ZTL’s in their main districts. Under Italian law bikes , ebikes and escooters are all vehicles unless the ZTL has an exemption you walking blood.

Here is what is actually being debated only one type of road always outside the comune and always with heavy tolls does the law even allow for and with the license plate camera tech you best follow this.

I travel to Italy on the regular to see fam if it’s not clear already.

Autostrade (Motorways - Type A):

Standard: 130 km/h (80 mph).

In Rain/Bad Weather: Reduced to 110 km/h (70 mph).

Strade Extraurbane Principali (Main Extra-Urban Roads - Type B/Strade Statali):

Standard: 110 km/h (68 mph).

In Rain/Bad Weather: Reduced to 90 km/h (56 mph).

Strade Extraurbane Secondarie (Secondary Roads - Type C/Provinciali):

Standard: 90 km/h (56 mph).

Urban Areas (Built-up Areas):

Standard: 50 km/h (30 mph).

Special Zones: Often 30 km/h (20 mph) near schools or
in town centers

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