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Last night I passed a fatal accident involving a smart car. The smart car was rear ended and then sent flying.... eventually ending up on its side. The driver of the smart car was killed. http://wgxa.tv/news/local/warner-robins-police-investigating-deadly-two-car-accident

Houston area police were involved in the cutest police chase ever this morning when a Smart Convertible led cops around the highways outside the city. Awwwwww! The Smart has a top speed of 90 MPH, so we aren't yet ready to call this a high speed chase. The driver was arrested without any issues after he pulled off the highway and into a driveway. There's no word on what he did wrong, other than drive a Smart Cabriolet in public. While not confirmed, we're hearing it was towed away from the scene by a local child with a big wheel.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Even a fender-bender in a fuel-efficient mini car can lead to thousands of dollars worth of repairs, the insurance industry found in new crash tests. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety reported Thursday that repairing damage to microcars in low-speed crashes of 3 to 6 miles per hour could cost anywhere from $474 to $3,701. The Institute conducted low-speed crash tests on the front and back bumpers and the front and rear corners of seven 2009 model year mini cars that have become more widely available with rising fuel costs in recent years. The Kia Rio racked...

You know what state needs more smart fortwos? Texas. That must have been Daimler's thinking before approving an expansion of the car2go carsharing service there. Daimler started car2go in Ulm, Germany last October and it will be coming to Austin, Texas - that little blueberry in the big red cherry pie of a state - this fall. There are now more than 200 fortwo cdi models that anyone in Ulm, visitor or resident, can rent by the minute, hour or day, 24/7. Costs range from 19 euro cents a minute to 9.90 euros an hour to 49 euros a day....

The federal government is preparing to spend millions to purchase a fleet of small electric vehicles that critics compare to golf carts. The $838 billion economic stimulus bill that passed the Senate yesterday contains $300 million for the government to purchase a fleet of "green" cars. But the money won't just go to buy fuel-efficient hybrids such as the Ford Escape or Chevy Volt. The cash also can be used to purchase "neighborhood electric vehicles." The NEVs, which resemble streamlined golf carts, scoot at up to 25 mph, operate on battery power and can be plugged into 110-volt outlets for...

Rush Rides In A Smart Car

It's a problem that has baffled German engineers, auto industry experts, Kern County road engineers and, most importantly, Samuel Wattles of Rosamond: How do you make a left turn in a new Smart Car? Wattles waited a year and a half for his Smart ForTwo - a tiny, two-passenger car that gets more than 40 miles per gallon - only to find that the lightweight vehicle wasn't heavy enough to set off the sensors that activate left-turn signal lights at intersections. At least, that's what he thought was going on when he picked up the car July 20 in North...

As a regular combatant in the daily grand prix on our local roadways, I have received many one-fingered salutes from my fellow motorists, all well-deserved. But from my first joyride in the new Smart car I brought home a month ago, the only salutes being flipped in my direction are a steady stream of thumbs-ups. It's possible that some people are waving goodbye. Enthusiasm for the new microcar from Mercedes appears to be exceeded only by the expectation that anybody crazy enough to drive one will soon be pulverized by a passing Peterbilt. The question about the car I get...

WASHINGTON (AP) - A government crash test of the 2008 Smart Fortwo micro car, the fuel- sipping vehicle that made its debut in the United States this year, found a safety concern in side-impact testing, officials said Thursday. During the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration side test on the Smart two-door, the driver door unlatched and opened. The government said that could increase the likelihood of a driver or passenger being ejected from the 8-foot, 8-inch vehicle. NHTSA, however, still gave the car its top score of five stars in side testing because of the ability of the car to...

Volkswagen Up! Concept Wolfsburg, September 2007. There are cars that endure for all times. They are icons of their type, masterpieces of craftsmanship and technology; they put ideas into motion, make progress tangible and sometimes quite simply make everyday life better, more practical and enjoyable. Many of these cars carry the VW logo. “Bug, Beetle, New Beetle”, “T1, Bulli, Samba bus, California”, “Golf, GTI”. Now Volkswagen is presenting – as a world premiere at the International Motor Show (IAA) in Frankfurt – a concept car that once again has the right stuff needed to move more than just one...

German car maker Daimler said Tuesday that next month's launch of its tiny Smart car in the United States will unleash such stiff demand the company will have trouble meeting it. We will not be able to meet demand thus far" for 2008, Daimler chairman Dieter Zetsche said here at a news briefing. More than 30,000 US customers have put down 99-dollar deposits to reserve one of the fuel-saving, two-seat Smart Fortwo, which will begin arriving in the massive US market in January, he said. "Down payments are going far beyond the production capacity we have," the chairman said,...

"The Smart's base price is $11,590, and a fully loaded Smart Fortwo Passion convertible goes for $16,950. The 1,800-pound car gets 40 miles per gallon."

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - DaimlerChrysler (DCXGn.DE) is leaning toward launching its Smart minicar in the United States, DaimlerChrysler Chief Executive Dieter Zetsche said in a newspaper interview on Sunday. ADVERTISEMENT [0] "At the moment, the tendency is clearly positive," Zetsche said in an interview with Germany's Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung. A final decision on whether to sell the car in the United States will be taken this month, he said. Zetsche repeated that he expected the loss-making Smart unit to turn a profit in 2007. Smart is focusing on building only a two-seat model after deciding to scrap its slow-selling four-seater earlier...

Small cars driving through a safari park in Merseyside have been chased by confused lions who think they are prey. Staff at Knowsley Safari Park are monitoring smaller vehicles, including Smart cars and Mini Coopers, after the lions started paying special interest. David Ross, park manager, told the BBC News website that a group of lionesses chased after one Smart car after being confused by its compact appearance. He said staff were stationed near the enclosure to keep visitors safe. 'Raise an eyebrow' Unusual features on cars can also spark interest by the 12 lions at the park, which are...

IT'S Smart but it's certainly not clever, and it has cost Daimler-Chrysler more than e2bn (£1.4bn) since its launch. Now the question is: how much longer will the carmaker continue to underwrite the underperforming Smart car? Heralded as the future of urban personal transport when it was launched in 1998, the car was environmentally friendly, ergonomically appealing and space efficient. But DaimlerChrysler's unique minicar has been revealed in the German media as a costly failure with 2004 losses of about e600m, making the overall dent in its creator's pocket up to e2bn.

The California company that has cleared legal hurdles to sell two-seat Smart cars in the United States has put its first saleable unit on eBay. On Friday afternoon the top bid for the car, a red Smart fortwo with 586 miles on the odometer, stood at $12,300. The auction is set to end on Dec. 12 at 9:44 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. Zap, of Santa Rosa, Calif., wants to sell 15,000 of the two-seat cars a year in the United States. It hopes to sign 150 dealerships by summer. Zap doesn't get the Smarts directly from parent company DaimlerChrysler AG....

Okay, know going in that this story is going to cause your brain to curdle. You've got French technology, French manufacturing, and a French driver all going wildly, terribly wrong. On top of that you have a not-ready-for-prime-time Google translation from German to English. It's going to be a rough ride, but once you get into the spirit of the thing it just sort of skips along. To set the scene: You have a cutting-edge French car with "smart" technology that takes so many little, irritating tasks away from the driver. You know, little things like air conditioningl, seat adjustment,...