It's not far away. She's filming with 0.5x zoom so everything looks far. It's perfectly reachable and frankly it doesn't need to be any bigger than that.
The PRNDL on some modern semis is no bigger than that. If it works for them it should work for a mini.
My only qualm with the PRNDL is it’s in the exact same spot as the window up/down was in the 2013 R56 Mini. So when I went from my 2013 to the 2025 I nearly threw myself into reverse while trying to close the window because of old habits 😅
The third generation Mini’s “start/stop” toggle is in the center, in the same position as the first generation’s central lock toggle.
So I’m driving the older one, park, tap what my muscle memory thinks is the start/stop toggle… and all the door lock mechanisms go ‘click’ and the engine doesn’t stop. Oh. Oops.
I still look at the ceiling for a clock out of habit.
Mini 850cc Automatic, 1965. The 'spirit of the Mini' was to give a practical, affordable family car, with Issigonis passionately hating the Messerschmitt bubble cars and wanting to get them off the roads. You're likely thinking of the Cooper version, which Issiginis was originally against making - he didn't want a sports version of the Mini to start with.
Issigonis also wanted to simplify - cars at the time had controls and dials coming out of their ears, he thought that was unnecessary and reduced it to a single dial. He was basically right - I had a 70s Mini with the single dial, and an 80s Mini with the behind-the-dash dials...I preferred the 70s one.
Not to be that guy but there absolutely is a transmission - after all, it has to "transmit" power from the motor(s) to the wheels somehow. EVs can also definitely have more than one gear. Take a look at Formula E - those are an awesome example of multiple-speed EV transmission. Of course, this is unnecessary for (most) road EVs.
It still seems like it would be distracting as fuck sticking out like that, but I'm the kind of person who tapes over LEDs on my keyboard, so maybe I'm an outlier in that respect.
The gear shifter is that little switch on the left of that panel? That is an astoundingly bad design. Granted, plenty of car companies seem to aggressively competing with one another for worst gear shift design.
It shouldn't be mistakeable for the a/c controls! All it takes is a passenger that wants to change the a/c and isn't familiar with the car to make a multi thousand dollar mistake. I assume/hope that while in drive and moving you cannot accidentally flip it into park or reverse.
Nah you get a Mini because your parents are loaded and want you to have THE iconic mean girl car for your 18th birthday.
You get a Mini because you don't know what the words "engine bay" means.
You get a Mini because you love having a karting with really good power to weight ratio only to drive 20 over in midttown and 20 under wherever speeding is actually manageable.
And last but not least you get a Mini to celebrate opening your second hair salon.
Cars arent awful but the Mini driving demographic is something else.
They probably are, but they are in a completely different segment even compared to the first "new" Minis from 25 years ago. An Abarth is closer to the original Mini experience.
Maybe you might. When I buy an expensive vehicle I'm usually buying it for its behavior as a vehicle and whether the design makes it possible for me to engage with it in a low frustration way.
I would argue that the important things to the "spirit" of a car are in almost everything else about the design and execution before the superficial visual cues.
I actually did consider a Mini for its form factor and driving characteristics. I will never buy one of the current Gen ones because a gauge cluster in a tablet in the center of the dash and the elimination or poor choice of physical control type and placement are bad UX.
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u/Error-451 14h ago
That round screen is the ugliest shit I've ever seen