Hybrid automakers, concerned their vehicles are dangerously quiet, may incorporate fake engine sounds into future models for the safety of pedestrians.Hybrid automakers, concerned their vehicles are dangerously quiet, may incorporate fake engine sound effects into future models for the sake of pedestrians.

MIKE JOSEPH IMPERIALE, 72, LOWER EAST SIDE, NEW YORK

As the owner of a noiseless vehicle, what are your thoughts?

Have I ever run into people on my scooter? Yes. They don’t look where they’re going. Just now I almost ran into someone coming down 4^th Street. She said, “Oh, I’m sorry.” I said, “‘Sorry’? If I would have hit you, you would have been crying in the street.”

How loud should a car be?

Not loud at all. I think a car should be as smooth as anything. The problem is that people don’t look where they’re going.

How often do you use that horn button you’ve got there?

This? [presses button, causing loud beeping] Never.

Why do you use a scooter?

I’ve got Dystonia which is a Jewish genetic disorder—I’m not even Jewish. My face and my limbs would pull away at angles. They gave me an operation on the brain when I was 21, and it corrected most of it. I walk in my house. Outside, I’ll get off my scooter when I’m going into a store with a step. I’ve been using a scooter for 15 years. My top speed is five miles per hour—it’s brisker than a walk. Before that I would walk to the park every day and sing:

“Here I go, there I go / Pretty baby you are soul to snap my control / That’s a funny thing but every time I’m near you / I never could be heard / you could smile or drop some of your magic / There’s music all around me / Praising you / They’re close to me / In your eyes there are stars that shine up above us / I cannot just look up / Baby come here / You could blow on by if you want to”

You’ve got a nice singing voice.

Thank you. That was an old song by Big Mike Blow Hot or something from the 50s.

ZERED BASSETT, 24, EAST VILLAGE, NEW YORK

How does that strike you?

I mean, owning one of those cars would be crazed because it wouldn’t sound like you’re driving a car. I could see them being dangerous, definitely, if you can’t hear it coming. It would be like riding a skateboard with soft wheels—people don’t hear it and they don’t get out of your way.

Have you ever put on softer, quieter wheels so you wouldn’t attract security?

Sometimes. That way they’d have to get off their lazy asses and walk around the building to find you.

Really?

Yeah.

How loud should a car be?

I’ve never really thought of that. Some people can’t afford a quieter car. I wouldn’t say it’s inappropriate.

Have you had close calls with cars?

Yeah, everyday. A car will turn right in front of you.

Do you skitch on cars often or just when you’re feeling like a show-off?

Pretty much just when my legs are too tired to push.

If you could pick a car and then assign it a sound effect, what would it be?

I’d probably want an old classic like a Camero that ran like a new car. I’d give it a loud engine. You don’t want to be in a badass car sounding like a hybrid.

You mean a “pussy” car?

Yeah.

JIMMY M., 50, FORT GREENE, BROOKLYN

Your hat says Thrasher like the band. I saw them once at CBGB. I got arrested there once. Some guys tried to sell my friend fake drugs, so we jumped them in the bathroom.

Was it just crappy coke?

No, they were these funny green capsules with liquid inside. Downers. They would make her comatose but she liked to do them. Anyway, what these guys at the club did was they stuck the capsules with a syringe and sucked out the drug. Then they injected water. Our friend could tell they were bullshit the second we got them to her.

As a bicyclist in New York City, how loud do you think a car should be?

I think if the cars are going to be quiet they had better use their horns and be alert for bike lanes. Have you seen the clowns? If you stand idle in a bike lane, they make all these hooting and hollering sounds and run around your car and tell you to leave. I saw them in front of the Cooper Union.

How do you feel about busses? Some are half hybrid.

Busses? I know a messenger who got killed in 86 by an express bus running down Fifth Avenue right by Bryant Park. This one time a cabbie ran me over. I hit my head and he crushed my bike. The cabbie was freaked out so he gave me $400 in cash and a ride to a bike shop to get me a new bike. The guy was shitting bricks. I had him buy me an $800 Trek road bike. That was a good day.

If you could silence one type of vehicle, which would it be?

The Fire Department! They’re so damn loud. RAAA-RAAAA-RAAA!

Those are professional heroes.

They are, but still.

I read they fake runs to get more funding.

You know what? I say let them get it if they can. A cop might not answer a call in a part of Bedford-Stuyvesant at 2 AM. But the fire department? I don’t care what neighborhood or ghetto you live in, they will go in that burning building with fucking axes and rescue your cat, your baby, no matter what the cost is. I give them much more credit than I do a cop.

-PETER MADSEN

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