Will nobody advocate for incremental improvements on the original SparkEV?
It's sad, because it's a tiny hatchback with full headroom and decent legroom in the back (for two), C3 charging rate, 240ft-lbs of torque (too much!), and a good balance of cheap and usable.
It needed better range, even just a bit more at 130km on a nice day or 80km in winter. Storage is tiny, but the hatch and shape make up for that when you put rear seats down.
While it was a compliance car without the skateboard chassis, it was a great first BEV attempt, and the tiny efficiency of the design works because even with a Chevy badge it's primarily a Korean car.
The category is something we need a lot more of. It's reasonable to not haul around huge battery packs for errands and commute.
Not everyone needs wild west intercity commuting range. Last intercity trip I took in the SparkEV required a 10-minute charge to make the 160km round trip, no biggie really since I had to answer a phone call anyway.
Yes, we have a long range vehicle too as we live in the countryside, but in different circumstances we would probably just rent for the long road trips, or car co-op.
Yea, all these labels are true. I think the point many are missing about naming is that these terms can ideally be used rhetorically, i.e. to help people pay attention to a risk, by tailoring the terms to the context.
Risk Communication is an interesting field, and we'll all be needing to understand it better shortly.