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Celebrating 70 years of Piaggio’s eponymous three-wheelers

Despite a dispute about the actual date of birth of the 50cc 'bees', people across Italy are already celebrating the anniversary of the iconic vehicle's birth.

Published: 27 June 2017 11:23 CEST

Celebrating 70 years of Piaggio's eponymous three-wheelers

File Photo: Filippo Monteforte/AFP

They can be seen buzzing down (often the middle) of many an Italian country lane but these days are just as likely to make an appearance, restored, in the fanciest thoroughfares of major cities. Piaggio's iconic 3-wheeler, the Apecar, celebrates 70 years since the first models were released onto the market in 1947.

Enthusiasts disagree over the Ape's exact date of birth: prototypes were made available for sale in 1947 although the ape was only officially released in 1948. Diehard fans however have already started celebrating the vespa's cousins birth. The Italian Ape Club are due to meet in the northern city of Aosta for a series of celebrations next month.

The classic lightweight model, the 'Apetta', has a 50CC engine and only 2.5 horsepower, yet it can carry weights of up to 205 kilograms. A staple of post-war Italian agriculture, more than 2.5 million 3-wheel, 4-wheel and even 5-wheel models have been sold in Europe alone.

The original two models were sold for 170,000 lira. Some models however have become a rare find and a stamp of exclusivity: only a limited edition of 100 of the 2007 electric model 'Calessino' were produced, each starting at €22,000, according to La Repubblica.

READ MORE: Trump declares war on the Vespa

A version of the Ape is also produced in India since 2006 and is known as the Apé. Cheaper clones of the classic Piaggio 3-wheeler have also been designed by other companies, such as Tata in India.

Bee in the movies

The Ape has also starred in several high profile films since its inception, from classics such as Francesco Rosi's 1958 film The Challenge or The Passenger by Michelangelo Antonioni to – more recently – Cars 2, The Transporter and Grand Budapest Hotel. It also played a key role in the 1972 film The Italian Connection, said to be an inspiration behind Tarantino's Pulp Fiction.

Nine-times World MotoGP champion Valentino Rossi famously drove a vamped-up version as a teenager, his father Graziano describing it as “the most dangerous vehicle he (Valentino) ever drove.”

READ MORE: Valentino Rossi injured after motorbike accident

From lizards to water, eco-bumps snag Tesla's giant Berlin car factory

Tesla's gigafactory outside the doors of Berlin. dpa-Zentralbild | Patrick Pleul

“When I saw on TV that the Tesla factory was going to be built here, I couldn’t believe it,” said Steffen Schorch, driving his trusty German-made car.

The 60-year-old from Erkner village in the Berlin commuter belt has become one of the faces of the fight against the US auto giant’s first European factory, due to open in the Brandenburg region near Berlin in July.

“Tesla needs far too much water, and the region does not have this water,” said the environmental activist, a local representative of the Nabu ecologist campaign group.

Announced in November 2019, Tesla’s gigafactory project was warmly welcomed as an endorsement of the “Made in Germany” quality mark – but was immediately met with opposition from local residents.

Demonstrations, legal action, open letters – residents have done everything in their power to delay the project, supported by powerful
environmental campaign groups Nabu and Gruene Liga.

Tesla was forced to temporarily suspend forest clearing last year after campaigners won an injunction over threats to the habitats of resident lizards and snakes during their winter slumber.

READ MORE: Is Germany’s Volkswagen becoming ‘the new Tesla’ as it ramps up e-vehicle production?

And now they have focused their attention on water consumption – which could reach up to 3.6 million cubic metres a year, or around 30 percent of the region’s available supply, according to the ZDF public broadcaster.

The extra demand could place a huge burden on a region already affected by water shortages and hit by summer droughts for the past three years.

Local residents and environmentalists are also concerned about the impact on the wetlands, an important source of biodiversity in the region.

Tesla Street

“The water situation is bad, and will get worse,” Heiko Baschin, a spokesman for the neighbourhood association IG Freienbrink, told AFP.

Brandenburg’s environment minister Axel Vogel sought to play down the issue, saying in March that “capacity has not been exceeded for now”.

But the authorities admit that “the impact of droughts is significant” and have set up a working group to examine the issue in the long term.

The gigafactory is set to sprawl over 300 hectares – equivalent to approximately 560 football fields – southwest of the German capital.

Tesla is aiming to produce 500,000 electric vehicles a year at the plant, which will also be home to “the largest battery factory in the world”,
according to group boss Elon Musk.

In a little over a year and a half, swathes of coniferous forest have already been cleared to make way for vast concrete rectangles on a red earth base, accessed via the already iconic Tesla Strasse (Tesla Street).

German bureaucracy

The new site still has only provisional construction permits, but Tesla has been authorised by local officials to begin work at its own risk.

Final approval depends on an assessment of the project’s environmental impact – including the issue of water.

In theory, if approval is not granted, Tesla will have to dismantle the entire complex at its own expense.

But “pressure is being exerted (on the regulatory authorities), linked to Tesla’s significant investment”, Gruene Liga’s Michael Greschow told AFP.

In early April, Tesla said it was “irritated” by the slow pace of German bureaucracy, calling for exceptions to the rules for projects that help the environment.

Economy Minister Peter Altmaier agreed in April that his government “had not done enough” to reduce bureaucracy, lauding the gigafactory as a “very important project”.

Despite Germany’s reputation for efficiency, major infrastructure projects are often held up by bureaucracy criticised as excessive by the business community.

Among the most embarrassing examples are Berlin’s new airport which opened last October after an eight-year delay and Stuttgart’s new train station, which has been under construction since 2010.

Brandenburg’s economy minister, Joerg Steinbach, raised the possibility in February that the Tesla factory could be delayed beyond its July planned opening for the same reason.

SEE ALSO: Tesla advertises over 300 jobs for new Gigafactory near Berlin

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