What makes the T.25 city car worth keeping an eye on

There has been quite a bit of attention being paid to the T.25 car lately, an extremely tiny (smaller than the Mercedes Smart) car that has been under development by famed F-1 engineer Gordon Murray for the past decade. The car seems to be nearing completion, and it has the potential to make a big difference. Some of the reasons why:

- It's built by Gordon Murray. Image counts, and though cars that look like this are often sneered at in the beginning:

the fact that he is the one that has designed it means it gets instant attention from those that prefer powerful cars and otherwise wouldn't give it a second look.

- Top speed is 145 kph. Cars that can only achieve top speeds of 80 to 100 or a bit above are often looked down upon as glorified golf carts, something a serious driver wouldn't touch.

- Price. The T.25 is expected to sell for just $9000, and the electric version for twice that. I doubt the electric version will be that popular considering its short range, as well as the fact that the fuel-powered version already has a phenomenal fuel economy - 74 mpg or 3.83 L / 100 km.

- Finally, the development process, known as iStream. Through this process one can redesign a car on any given day through just rewriting the software used, which makes setting up a plant a much easier process - according to this article where you can read more details about it it's both five times smaller and five times less expensive.

Reuters has a video on the car as well on YouTube that it has disabled embedding for, so you'll have to go here to watch it. The only question I have is this: since the car opens by raising the entire front of the car, what happens when it's raining?