Little did we know the car of the future will be here rather soon. Or at least, that's what Smart is saying. The 2012 Smart ForTwo Electric Drive will provide a little slice of the future as soon as next Spring.
To prove it, Smart has created a rather cool video showing us some other technologies of the future, even going as far as to suggest when exactly we'll see them.
Hoverboards, as seen in Back To The Future II? 2063, apparently. Can't imagine they'd be cheap though. And none of us will be around to see teleportation become reality, since Smart reckons that'll appear in 3014.
Anyway, the point of all this is that Smart's updated Electric Drive represents a futuristic means of transportation you can use very soon.
The 2012 Smart ForTwo Electric Drive should at least improve in several key areas over its predecessor. Power rises from a peak of 41 horsepower to a peak of 74, and top speed is now 75mph, up from 62mph. The 17.6 kWh battery allows for an 87 mile range in city traffic, also an improvement over the previous model's Tesla-sourced 14 kWh unit.
We've not tried the updated Electric Drive yet (the car was revealed at the 2011 Frankfurt Auto Show as static display only) but the 2011 model was fun to drive, if a little unresponsive on occasion. Hopefully the extra power will see to that.
Car of the future, today? If you live in the city, it should be a perfectly good car of today, today.
