A ‘microcar’ is an enclosed automobile built on a very small and light scale. It is often constructed using motorcycle and motorscooter components.
A microcar is not fully a car. It’s a sort of half-car, which fits into your life as an addition to a larger car, or to public transportation, either of which will meet your long-range and high speed travel needs. This limitation of a microcar gives it a bad rap. We immediately compare it to a multi-purpose full-size car in terms of highway performance, passenger capacity and comfort, etc., and finding the microcar a poor cousin, we don’t take it seriously.
In this respect, a microcar is similar to an electric car: It does a limited job more economically. See a video of the moonbeam, which gets 100 Miles per gallon.
