The new Popemobile will be a Fiat. Well, sort of. The most Italian manufacturer of cars that cost less than your soul (we’re looking at you, Italian supercars) has done a deal with the Governorate of the Vatican City State to supply it with 30 vehicles—consisting of the aggressively cute, all-electric Fiat Topolino and the similarly EV Fiat TRIS three-wheel delivery pickup.
The Topolino, you’ll recall, is basically a Fiatine interpretation of the Citroen Ami quadricycle (they both sit under the Stellantis group), but with a tad more flair. The TRIS is a remake of the legendary Piaggio Ape trike delivery vehicle so beloved of last-mile delivery and ‘characterful’ action movie chase scenes.
It’s all to do with the Vatican’s sustainable mobility development program, which it’s calling ‘Ecological Conversion 2030,’ aimed at reducing the CO2 footprint of its vehicle fleet, and dealing with ‘last-mile’ delivery in a friendly way. Which shouldn’t actually be that difficult when your city-state has pretty much everything a mile away, is landlocked within the bosom of Rome, has a population under 1,000 people, and is officially the smallest country in the world.
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Interestingly, Vatican City actually encompasses just 109 acres of real estate, which isn’t even a particularly large farm—if you’re going to deal with ‘urban mobility,’ it doesn’t get much more urban than this.
Still, the TRIS (not present at the handover event, but pictured above in Dolcevita concept form) can haul two standard euro pallets in its 2.25-meter-square trayback—there are covered options for the possible 420kg payload, too—and the 90km range from a 6.9kWh battery means it can do a fair few laps of the country, what with the Vatican City only being a couple of miles in circumference.
On the flipside, the Topolino (or ‘little mouse’) is also being delivered, presumably to move bishops and priests in a sustainable, micromobility manner. That’s a 45kph max, 75km range enclosed quadricycle with a 5.4kWh battery that charges from a home socket in four hours.
It’s only got 8hp and hits 100kph from rest in...never, the 0-45kph sprint taking 10sec. Perfect if you only need to go just over there, and not very quickly. Or take a quick spin around the Sistine Chapel GP circuit.
The Vatican is getting the first 20 Topolinos (one suspects the Pope got some sort of discount), and one of them has been delivered by...us. More on that very soon.
More images of the Ford Topolinos acquired by Pope Leo XIV and the Vatican City State:
NOTE: This article first appeared on TopGear.com. Minor edits have been made.
