Scoot Coupe: Hot Holiday Gift Or Barely-Legal Nightmare?

Is it a car? A scooter? A motorcycle? All of these questions are fair game when talking about three-wheeled cars, and the issue has even risen as high as the White House, with the Obama administration deciding they are in fact cars in the case of electric-powered three-wheelers like the Aptera 2e. But the legal status of the typical gasoline-powered, motorcycle-based vehicle is a lot more murky.

That's normally not a big problem, but interest in one model in particular, the Scoot Coupe, has seen a huge upwelling in public interest following an appearance on The Price Is Right game show's showcase prize. Now Google is getting hammered with searches for the vehicle, and towns are becoming wary of their "street legal" status.
Some towns have even gone so far as to ban them. Aside from the obvious addition of traffic to the roads, the issue is largely with their scooter-powered nature. Available in 50 cc and 150 cc displacements, the two-seater Scoot Coupe is the very definition of underpowered. Add to that minimal--if any--crash protection and you have what could potentially be a hugely problematic addition to the roadways.

Compounding the problem is the Scoot Coupe's bargain-basement price: just $6,299 for the 50 cc P50 model, and a mere $300 bump to $6,599 for the 150 cc P150.

On the other hand, this isn't the first such vehicle and it's not the first time they've risen to the public spotlight, so perhaps all the "sky is falling" antics are precisely that.

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