INSIDE
By Stephen Metzger
Managing Director
Small Vehicle Resource, LLC
[email protected]
www.smallvehicleresource.com
THE GATED
COMMUNITY
More on Transitional Vehicle You May Be
Seeing in Your Gated Community
A
recurrent theme in these columns
has been the evolution of small vehi-
cles and charging systems that could
well take place in gated communities and
planned municipal communities. Particu-
lar articles have covered:
• Diverse mobility systems, including
on-call vehicle sharing, self-driving,
multipassenger vehicles, and the useful-
ness of autonomous vehicles in the gated
community environment;
• Upgraded Level 2 charging systems for
individual residences and public access
areas;
• New types of enhanced electric vehicles
that bridge the gap between inside and
outside the gates travel needs.
In this context, I would like to look “under
the hood” of a new vehicle entry, the Baro
One and point out some of the significant
components that could transform the
small vehicle universe, including com-
mercially-available, cutting edge retro-fits
that can seriously upgrade performance
in your personal transportation vehicle
(PTV).
Innovation adoption as a two-way pro-
cess
Innovation rarely happens outside the
context of forces in the environment that
are simultaneously changing and set the
stage for the emergence of new products.
For example, the frenetic attention being
given the development of electric vehicles
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WWW.GOLFCAROPTIONS.COM
and the range of components from drive systems to
batteries would not have occurred without the height-
ened concern for the environment and the effort to
reduce hydrocarbon-derived pollution. On-road electric
vehicle development has, in turn, underwritten a huge
amount of on-going electric motor research and poten-
tial new avenues in battery technology.
The complimentary concern for urban congestion, as
well as air-born pollution, has spawned intense interest
not only in electric-powered vehicles, but also much
smaller vehicles, and vehicles integrated into more
optimal, smart cities. We are on the threshold of these
changes, which are, at the moment being spearheaded
by European manufacturers and in European urban
environments.
As these new products and systems emerge, they will
feedback on the whole concept of urban mobility, refin-
ing and further augmenting the development of cities of
the not-so-distant future. Along the way products will
come to the fore that are, in fact, immediately appli-
cable to cities and, in particular, the gated community,
such as yours, of today. One such product is the Baro
One low-speed vehicle and the many refinements it
brings to the table.
The Baro One as a transition vehicle
The Baro One Golf Car is a transition vehicle for a vari-
ety of reasons. This new vehicle, developed by Baro Ve-
hicles, based in Nuneaton, Warwickshire, U.K., has the
following features, which clearly differentiates it from
what we know as a “golf car”:
• Level 3 autonomy, which means the vehicle, through
its sophisticated sensory system and software, is close
to being fully autonomous, i.e., self-driving;