Here, in ascending order, are a few of the weight ratios that a 70-kilogram passenger can achieve: 0.1 for a 7-kilogram bicycle 1.6 for Italy’s 110-kilogram Vespa scooter 5 or less for a modern bus, and that’s just if you count sitting passengers 7.3 for France’s 510-kilogram Citroën 2CV (deux chevaux, or “two horses”), back in the 1950s 7.7 for the Ford Model T introduced in 1908 and also for Japan’s shinkansen rapid train that began to run in October 1964 (the train’s frugal ratio owes as much to design as it does to a high ridership rate) 12 for a Smart car, 16 for a Mini Cooper, 18 for my
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