Many of us are (or were until recently) glued to the home desk, away from the endless commute, bright office lighting and the fishbowl feel of your usual workplace. But what if we could move the home office to another location as often as we wanted? That would be nice, right?
Toyota was ahead of its time with that idea when they presented this concept car at the Tokyo Auto Show in 2001. That year’s slogan was roughly translated: ‘Open the doors! The bright future of the car’. The Toyota DMT – which stands for Dual Mode Traveler – was intended to provide a kind of flexible workspace for its imaginary owner.
The Toyota DMT was also a workplace
The concept had an office at the back, which looked like someone had popped into the nearest furniture discount store 40 minutes before the show started. But it was about the idea. There was a door between the cabin and the office, so you could walk back and forth a bit.
Many details about the technology are not known, but we do know that the Toyota DMT had a 2.4-litre petrol engine from the RAV4 of the time, which was also in the Previa, by the way. If it had ever gone into production, they would have fitted it with a hybrid engine.
More spacious than other vans
Up front, the Toyota DMT is spacious, not that claustrophobic of delivery vans from that time. Inside light woods, crazy seats with headrests model toilet roll and the buttons on the dashboard looked a lot like the controls of an iPod. The instrument panel stretched the full width of the car, turning the windshield a nice blue.
The solution to the housing shortage?
But, forget that office function: isn’t this also a great solution for the housing shortage? Park it in abandoned parking lots that are empty all night, and you can build a whole village. Place for thousands of inhabitants, right? Hugo doesn’t have to thank us for this bright idea.
Of course, our plan to accommodate people in parking lots in strange-looking vans may elicit responses such as ‘terribly depressing’ and ‘that’s not a way of life’. Otherwise, simply park your starter home near a park or by the sea. If you then open your doors, you will certainly see a bright future ahead of you.
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