Smart in Rome

Probably the first thing we noticed upon disembarking the jet that brought us from Paris to Rome--the last link of a three-leg/18-hour flight--was that the weather there in early October was pretty much the same as in Santa Barbara: clear, sunny, pleasantly warm days, with nights cooling off enough to make indoor and outdoor dining equally attractive depending on the neighborhood.

But it doesn't take long in Italy to notice one huge difference--the general size of vehicles on the streets and roads. They're tiny. More precisely, they're Smart! Besides the Vespas (literally wasps) buzzing in and around everywhere and the array of very minimal Fiats of all eras, the car of choice among Romans is the Smart Car by Daimler-Chrysler. They are clearly a hit with the Italians, who value style, convenience, and--obviously--economy.

The prevalence of these tiny beasts also seems to fit with a national character that recognizes the necessity to share precious public space among various uses. Romans are used to functioning in a city that exists on multiple levels and layers of time and history simultaneously: Etruscan, Classical, Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque, Neo-Classical, and Modern Rome all share the same few, walkable square miles of urban development. Nothing and no one--not even Michelangelo--gets to hog more than a fair share of the space, so it stands to reason that these folks are not going to hand over their streets to the sexually insecure with their Hummers and Lincoln Navigators.

If fuel economy weren't enough to sell these cars, parking would be. The attraction here is that drivers can park head-in where larger vehicles need to parallel park; thus two or three Smart Cars can fit in a spot just vacated by one Volvo wagon. (No one drives Suburbans there, but if someone did, he'd be using the space for--and no doubt angering--a swarm of Smart drivers.)

I have a hard time imagining these cars catching on in the States for a variety of reasons, but one might be a reluctance to venture out among the American behemoths with so little protection. No one worries about this in Italy, though, because small, sensible transportation is the rule rather than the exception. Another factor that weighs in favor of our Über-vehicle mentality, of course, is cheap gas. Let me put it this way, if Americans paid full-boat, unsubsidized prices for petroleum and made even a half-hearted attempt to include all the social costs that accrue from our profligate fuel consumption, we'd be riding Vespas, driving Smart Cars, and shouting "Ciao, Bella!" at our friends, too. But as it is, we think gas at $3.50 per gallon is a national emergency, while Europeans would be stunned to see it at five again.