Eco-friendly city driving

Toyota is offering drivers a glimpse of a cleaner and more eco-friendly future as it brings nimble, zero-emission motoring to crowded city centres with a fleet of its i-ROAD and COMS ultra-compact electric vehicles.

The chic and colourful three and four-wheelers will showcase how clean and easy urban motoring can be by taking part in a major pilot programme in the French city of Grenoble.

Citélib by Ha:mo is Toyota’s second ‘Ha:mo’ (short for Harmonious Mobility) project and the first outside Japan.

Toyota is a key partner in the three-year low-carbon car-sharing scheme, which is expected to transform the way people plan and make local journeys. The marque is supplying 35 units of each type of vehicle and is also contributing its Ha:mo system to manage the scheme on a day-to-day basis in line with a model that’s already been successfully tried across Toyota City in Japan.

Takayuki Yoshitsugu, chief representative, Middle East and North Africa Representative Office, Toyota Motor Corporation, said: “This concept is in line with Toyota’s overall future mobility vision which is based on four pillars: safety, comfort, ease of use and ecology. Ha:mo was designed to reduce the stress caused by traffic jams, peak traffic hours, and searching for a parking space. It also allows a reduction in emissions that cause poor air quality in city centres. From Toyota’s perspective, such initiatives reflect our constant efforts at developing new and innovative forms of mobility while tapping into new growth areas in the urban transportation sector.”

 The i-ROAD uses Active Lean technology that steers in a similar way to the movements of a skier. It’s not much larger than a motorbike or scooter, but has a full canopy that protects the driver from the elements and gives the kind of secure feeling and comfort of a car.

The concept is seen as a way of building a better-integrated public transport service, where people collect an electric vehicle from a location near their home or office to drive to a local transport hub for the next stage of their journey. Likewise, people arriving by bus or train can step into a car on arrival to complete the last leg of their trip. The network of charging stations is seamlessly connected to Grenoble’s transport network IT system to make total journey planning easier.

During the pilot, the programme partners will gather data on technical issues and user behaviour to help shape future mobility initiatives.