"Getting on the Grid," Feature Article, March 2003

neighborhood watch

The strange vehicle parked next door barely fits in the driveway.

by Saul Parkee

Sometimes I feel a bit silly taking my HumVee down to the supermarket to buy eggs. Sure, kids smile at the size of my toy, and ladies linger over thoughts of joining me on my next drive north to the Arctic Circle. But by the time I open the door to my climate-controlled garage, start the electric seats warming and the heated windshield defrosting, and give the big 6.5-liter turbo diesel enough time to gulp down a gallon while warming up the cabin, I could almost walk there. I guess when you have a Hummer, every transportation problem is a nail.

Saul's HumVee.

My neighbor isn't much of a car buff. I see him outside wrenching on his old heap every once in a while. He takes it down to the store sometimes. Most days he walks over to the train station or the bus stop and the car just sits.

"When you gonna tow that eyesore outta here and buy some new wheels?" I yell to him occasionally as I drive by.

So the other day when a truck-and-trailer stops by the house and drops off the Mickey Mouse car, I'm thinking, "Uh oh. What the heck is that nut up to now?"

I keep a close watch that week on my neighbor's activity. He has a houseful of people in over the weekend. They pile four, sometimes five, at a time into the car and set off motoring. They come back after 15 minutes—maybe half an hour—and I watch him plug the car back in. I'm an electrician, so I know when someone's on the grid.

He must have sensed I was watching. Monday night he knocks on my door. "Come on, Saul. Let's go for a ride," he says. "You need anything from the A&P?"

I hesitate. What will people think if they see me in that thing? But under night's cover no one should recognize me. Besides, my wife needs milk, and I've already put the HumVee to bed. I meet him outside.

After unzipping the doors, we climb in. He backs out of the driveway. The pinging backup alarm reminds me of something I want to get for the Hummer. The heater port makes more noise than heat as he hops the car across our busy street and onto a side road.

"I'll pull over here so you can try it," he says.

He fiddles with the door zipper, then climbs out as I slide behind the wheel. After he settles in on the passenger side, he points out the parking brake, forward-reverse switch, "gas" pedal, brake, and turn signals. The car is on, but it makes no sound. I step on the gas and off we go.

In a moment we are moving at 22 mph. The pedal's floored. A green numerical display flashes first our speed, then our percent of charge remaining on the batteries.

The back road we're on seems surprisingly wide. While two Hummers parked side by side could almost fill the lane from shoulder to shoulder, it would take at least three and probably four of these slim GEM vehicles to span it. We take two lefts and wind up back near the main road.

"We could go out there, where the adults drive," he says. The vehicle's allowed on roads posted 35 mph or less, he explains. But the first night he had the car he headed down that street and ended up dragging a long line of cars behind him. "One SUV guy got mad and went for the horn before I could pull into the parking lot," he says. Since then, he'd been sticking to the side streets.

I'm surprised that I can't just make a U in the road. Instead, I have to reverse it once to pull around with a K-turn. The four-passenger version I'm driving has a longer wheelbase compared with the two-seater, he explains. The two-up model puts only 71 inches between front and rear wheel centerlines, according to the brochure he shows me later. A runabout, I call that. Seventy inches is about the width between my HV's two front tires.

Down the other way, and I'm beginning to see how this little car could fit the scale of side streets. The 25-mph speed limit I strain to maintain in my HumVee suits this car perfectly. No worrying about running over dogs or kids the way I do when I move three tons of steel along these streets. No way of overdriving these headlights either, I think.

I'd never admit it to any of my 4WD pals, but I'm having fun. Regen braking. Plug-in power. These things you can't get in a Hummer. Too bad it's not practical.

Two lefts and we're closing in on the A&P. Another 100
yards down the busy main street and we pull into the parking lot. I remember to cancel the turn signal.

The car has enough height to draw the notice of other drivers in the lot. More massive cars give way. I grab a spot. I turn off the key. A beep reminds me to set the brake.

Ordinarily, the car garners a lot of attention, my neighbor tells me. In his brief time with it, several people have come up to ask him questions. Commuters at the train station, waiting for their rides, asked him how it would work as a second car. But, it's a cold Monday night. Perhaps the curious aren't in the mood tonight. We go in unmolested.

"It could use a little more speed," I tell him. Thirty or 35 would be perfect. You could go almost anywhere.

It's a matter of fitting the tool to the task, he says.

"Do you really need the capacity to climb over a 22-inch log?" he asks.

"No, not all the time," I say.

"How many streams do you expect to ford on your drive to Dunkin' Donuts?" he asks.

"Generally, none," I say, "unless the monsoon season begins on the way over."

When he starts foaming over about cold start emissions, how the little car could handle a lot of short trips that don't make the best use of full-size cars, I tune him out. But the message of saving wear and tear on my expensive Hummer, not to mention rain and mud all over the wax job, does register a blip. The point that the auto industry is banking emission credits with these little cars so they can continue selling real cars is not lost on me either.

We drive back home in silence. I've lived in this town for 20 years and this is probably only the third time I've been on this road. Kind of peaceful back here, I'm thinking.

The next morning I leave for work early. It's still dark as I walk outside. Across the way I can just make out the little red GEM, finishing up its charge after last night's run.

The car's yellow extension cord snakes out the back seat and across his lawn. Good old off-peak power, I'm thinking—plenty of it for the taking. But my eyes keep following the cord as it runs off his lawn and
past my foot. "Why is he in my driveway ..." I start to ask as I turn around.

Of course, my answer is right there at the end of the cord, plugged in at our outlet.

Associate editor Paul Sharke's fictional neighbor, Saul, reports this month on his drive of the GEM neighborhood electric vehicle made by Global Electric Motorcars in Fargo, N.D. Look for Sharke's story about his own GEM road test in an upcoming ME article on home fueling.