Fiat Topolino

This is a rebadge of the Citroen Ami, a funky-looking little electric vehicle—a quadricycle, not a car, which is important—released back in 2020 and about which I've heard surprisingly little. The Ami is quintessentially Citroen, which is to say: idiosyncratic. It's totally symmetrical—left/right and front/back. You can't tell if it's coming or going. It looks different, but I hesitate to say that it looks good.

The Topolino, however, supplies the panache in spades. In style and size, it hearkens to the 1950s-70s Fiat 500, down to the anchovy-tin retractable roof and total lack of grille. It's cute!

Here's the kicker, though: neither the Ami nor the Topolino are cars. They're quadricycles. It's an EU thing, limits on size and weight and top speed in exchange for reduced regulations. But the star of this particular piece of legislation, as far as I can tell, is that you can operate a quadricycle from 14 years old (dependent on the EU member state). Which is weird, right? That teens can go out and buy and drive a new Fiat?¹

1. From £99/mo, which, I knew well-heeled teens living with their parents back at DPHS who had that kind of monthly cash to spend. ↩︎