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from
The Independent
July 3, 2004
Leonardo's Car Springs into Life After Lying on Drawing Board for More Than 500 Years
by Peter Popham in Rome
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 So this is where we went wrong. Here is the fork in the road. More than 500 years before politicians and environmentalists wrestled with the threats and appetites of the SUV, Leonardo da Vinci showed us the way to go: an automobile made of wood, controlled by the world's first computer, and consuming the cheapest fuel in the world,  elbow grease.
After several fruitless attempts, experts in Leonardo studies and robotics have finally worked out how the Leonardo automobile was intended to function. A full-size model of the car was on show in the Museo Leonardiano, in the Tuscan village of Vinci where the genius was born.
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But it is unlikely to catch on. For a start, there is nowhere to sit; it seems the vehicle was conceived for Renaissance court theatrical performances, to amaze and delight the local lords and ladies with the sight of a vehicle trundling along, turning corners and coming gently to a halt with no human involvement of any sort. In conception, the vehicle is closer to the sort of wheeled robots that whiz around Japanese factories, fetching and carrying, than to a passenger-bearing car.
It has three wheels, two at the front and one at the back, so with the operator perched on it setting the navigation system it looks like an over-size Stone Age ice-cream cart.
From “Leonardo’s car springs into life after lying on the drawing board for more than 500 years” by Peter Popham from The Independent, July 3, 2004. Copyright © 2004 by Independent Newspapers. Reproduced by permission of the copyright holder.
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