I think you have answered your Question 1 with part of Question 2. I suspect the lack of popularity has something to do with the spate of accidents a few years back. But I've long been interestd in autogyros and they do seem to have many advantages and few disadvantages.
Thye are generally much quicker and cheaper to build than a light aircraft, so they are very much in the Microlight cost bracket. They can operate from smaller fields than light aircraft. As you say, they are much easier to store. They tend to be very simple machines, which keeps the costs down and makes them more reliable.
Downsides are:
Speed - they are generally quite slow. It's difficult to find a homebuilt gyro with cruising speed much above 70kts.. . . .Comfort - enclosed Gyros with cabin heaters are relative few and far between. And the RAF 2000 (which does have such luxuries) has a particular problem in that it is too noisy.
Lack of Training Facilities - finding an instructor and a two seat Gyro is not so easy as to encourage lots of people to have a go to see if it is something they like.
But having seen them in action, I would definitely like to add Gyroplane rating to my PPL.
[ 17 February 2002: Message edited by: tacpot ]</p>