“We want to be like everyone else!”

At NEWAV, we are convinced that adapted cars need to be improved.

Today, owning a vehicle is essential and represents freedom in everyday life, particularly for people with reduced mobility. We believe that the most concerned people are the most relevant to express their needs and expectations.

The limits of accessibility:

Lily, Charles and Nicolas told us about the limitations of the adapted vehicles they use every day:

• A very noisy vehicle: people in the back of the vehicle have difficulty communicating or following a conversation with passengers or the driver.

• A very limited view: people with reduced mobility travel in the trunk. Even today, they are unable to travel in the front seat: ‘He can only see the tarmac’, explains Nicolas' father.

• Difficult access to safety: in these vehicles, it is often difficult to secure wheelchairs, and this requires a great deal of physical effort on the part of those accompanying them: ‘it's quite acrobatic’, Charles's mother told us. 

• Daily discomfort: people who travel in their wheelchairs at the back of the vehicle are more exposed to shocks on the road, and also to noise, which makes journeys particularly stressful. Lily and her mother even admitted to us that they ‘limit their journeys to a maximum of one hour’.

• An unaesthetic vehicle: nowadays, only commercial car models are adapted, not ordinary travel vehicles.  This stigmatizes people with reduced mobility. Lily and her mum tell us ‘we want to be like everyone else’.

  
  

Although adapted vehicles are an essential mobility solution for people with disabilities, they have many constraints. By interviewing our future users, we very quickly grasped the importance of creating a new generation of improved adapted cars.

What NEWAV offers:

Based on the needs of people with disabilities, NEWAV aims to build the most accessible electric vehicle in the world. The vehicle will be attractive, comfortable, modular and soundproof, and wheelchair users will be able to choose the seat that suits them best. Their freedom of choice will finally be respected.

The testimonies of Lily, Charles, Nicolas and all the others are invaluable and form the basis of our commitment: to offer a vehicle designed by and for future users. Here, our mission is to design ‘a car like any other’, but adapted to the specific needs of each individual.