Practical Considerations
Despite the common misconception that the gull-wing doors are mere stylistic affectations, the design is a very practical one in a tight urban parking space. When properly designed and counterbalanced, they require little side-clearance to open (about 27.5 cm, or 11" in the DeLorean) and allow much better entrance/egress than conventional doors. The most obvious downside to having gull-wing doors is that, should the car roll over and come to rest on its roof, exit by the doors would be impossible, requiring a large wind screen opening to escape. The DeLorean had a windscreen that was able to be kicked out of place in the event of a roll-over.
A Volvo concept car (Volvo YCC) that was designed by and for women had gull-wing doors to make it easier to lift shopping bags or children into the car.
Read more about this topic: Gull-wing Door
Famous quotes containing the word practical:
“Whatever practical people may say, this world is, after all, absolutely governed by ideas, and very often by the wildest and most hypothetical ideas. It is a matter of the very greatest importance that our theories of things that seem a long way apart from our daily lives, should be as far as possible true, and as far as possible removed from error.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)