INSIDE
By Stephen Metzger
Managing Director
Small Vehicle Resource, LLC
[email protected]
www.smallvehicleresource.com
THE GATED
COMMUNITY
This May Be the Bridge Vehicle That
Provides What Your PTV Can’t
T
he small, task-oriented vehicle
(STDespite the many upgrades
to our personal transportation
vehicles (PTVs) over the years, such
as four-wheel disk brakes, rack and
pinion steering, optional automotive
glass, greater power, seat belts, turn
signal lights, etc. the vehicle as a con-
cept and as a practical tool for getting
you to point B from point A, continues
to have significant drawbacks.
How would you characterize a PTV?
Remember the phrase, “A jack of all
trades and a master of none”? We
could think of the PTV as a multi-use
vehicle and excelling in none in partic-
ular. It does get you around the gated
community and can be equipped for
light duty pick-up and delivery—and, of
course, is usually good for golf outings.
What does it lack? For one thing it is
confined; that is, unless equipped and
certified as a low-speed vehicle (LSV),
you cannot legally drive it on public
roads. Even if it is LSV-certified, public
road driving is confined to streets with
speed limits of 35 m.p.h. (This is the
usual restriction in probably a majori-
ty of jurisdictions around the country.)
20
WWW.GOLFCAROPTIONS.COM
You can complain all you want about NHTSA’s
nitpicking, but they lay out the rules, and they have,
if not the public’s support, the full backing of auto
insurance companies that are scared to death that
LSVs on public roads, and their prospective accident
and injury claims, would bankrupt them. Butting up
against NHTSA’s rules and regulation is a self-defeat-
ing effort. Ask my friend, Jim Tomberlin of Tomber-
lin Electric Vehicles. He pioneered the Anvil, a super
cool LSV, pictured at the left. Jim’s vision was to
make the Anvil a commuter transporter; that is,
something you could drive to the station, find a nice,
narrow space in which to park, and return home at
the end of the day with very little driving expense.
NHTSA deemed it unsafe for such use, however.
Undeterred,
Tomberlin de-
vised an air-
bag device for
the Anvil, a
unique safety
feature for an
LSV, but all to
no avail. I do
not believe
the Anvil is
Tomberlin Anvil circa2013
now in produc-
tion, although Tomberlin electric vehicles are still
very much in the small vehicle picture, particularly
with their E-Merge line of LSV vehicles.