Could the calorie burning car be the transport of the future? A team from the Netherlands thinks it could and have developed a prototype Pedal Powered Vehicle based on an Audi A4 Avant,

The FitCar PPV has been developed by Nasser Al Shawaf and Dutch engineering company BPO. It has a regular 2.0-litre petrol engine, but control of its acceleration is carried out through bicycle pedals hooked up to a flywheel. The accelerator is then controlled by an active pedalling motion rather than depressing the pedal in the normal way. It means that a driver can exercise while driving which gets around having to commute and go to the gym.

Inventor Nasser Al Shawaf comments, “I work in many cities around the world where a 60-minute-plus car commute, each-way, each day is not uncommon. This is an unhealthy way to waste more than two hours every day, so I came up with the idea of the FitCar.”

The car can be driven in three modes; fast for highway, slow for traffic and no drive for jams, meaning you can still exercise while waiting at the lights.

The new PPV has been patented internationally and is now awaiting approval for sale in the Netherlands.