In his 1967 song “Alice’s Restaurant Massacree,” Arlo Guthrie mentioned what is probably the quintessential hippy vehicle. To help out restaurant owner Alice, Arlo and his friend decided to take out the restaurant’s garbage:
We took the half a ton of garbage,
Put it in the back of a red VW Microbus
took shovels and rakes and implements of destruction
and headed
On toward the city dump
Those iconic 60s buses command high prices today and are in high demand. Despite the fact that they’re slow and not particularly comfortable, they have attained cult status.
And Volkswagen has noticed. During last year’s Car Week the manufacturer unveiled a prototype for an all-new electric version it calls the ID Buzz.
The new design, slated to hit the market in 2022, bears a resemblance to its ancestor--but with a twist. It kind of looks as if it could be a car driven by Marty McFly in “Back to the Future.”
Oddly enough, the van has had the nickname “Bulli” in Germany since 1960. "The Microbus, which is what the Bulli is called in America, has always been part of the California lifestyle," Herbert Diess, Volkswagen CEO, said in a statement ahead of the debut. "Now we're bringing it back by reinventing the Bulli as an electric vehicle."
The prototype unveiled at Pebble had a range of around 270 miles, but the production model’s range is yet to be announced, although speculation is that it will be higher. And it might be a bit peppier than its predecessors, sporting a 369 horsepower, two-motor system.
the concept version had about 270 miles of range on the EPA test cycle for its two-motor,
And it will probably have enough interior space to haul Alice’s garbage.