LOUDOUN INVENTOR'S GREEN CAR STRIKES CHORD WITH LEESBURG

Nick Turner drove past a group of 16 construction workers sitting on a curb, and 32 eyeballs locked onto the car he'd built. A guy walking into Office Depot laughed with delight and said, "I knew the economy was bad, but this is ridiculous!" Outside a bar the other night, drunk people were lining up for rides, hanging off the back of the car and asking how they could get one, too.

And then there are the downsides to designing a car powered by pedals and small electric batteries. Like when his car can't make it up a hill, and he has to get out and push. Or when yet another tire blows out. But in a place such as Leesburg, where so many people slog through long commutes every day, Turner's low-impact, decidedly low-tech pedal car has struck a chord. People smile when they see it. They honk. They pull over and jump out of their cars to take a closer look. The positive reactions have Turner thinking he should market and sell these things.

Turner, who just transferred to Old Dominion University to study mechanical engineering, loves cars. He always has: He built them from Legos for demolition derbies as a kid, fixed his friends' old cars in high school, enjoys long drives. But at some point he started to worry about the environment and feel guilty about all the gas he was using.

So he took the emergency brake out of an old Honda Civic, ordered a go-kart steering wheel online, took apart a pink little girl's bike and welded together a steel frame in the back yard of his parents' house. The result is a three-speed, two-seat car. The car is meant for tooling around town on slower roads; the top rate from the motor fed by the three batteries is 23 mph. He plans to add seat belts, mirrors and other safety features. Someday.

In the meantime, he's having fun. The car eventually will have a fiberglass shell and windows that open and shut, but for now, it's cage-like, with no driver's-side door and red clamps holding the trunk closed. The pedal shafts say Bulletproof - a brand name but a nice touch. On a recent morning, he pedaled through a strip-mall parking lot, asking only the barest assist from the electric batteries, which he may replace with gas because they last only 10 miles. Or maybe a solar panel on the roof. Maybe a few different versions, under the Tuhart name he coined.

He stopped and stepped out, a young man with little silver glasses and cargo shorts and a crazy little car. People swarmed.