The Official Complaint Thread!
- Thread starter Jacques Strap
- Start date
Arn
Active member
I worked on a project here in Belfast putting in a load of electric car charge points across Northern Ireland. We put about 100 in around the country.
In the first year about half of them had never been used. The one that had seen the most use was outside the Department of Environment building (cos they owned and used an electric vehicle). And the biggest source of income from the charge points was in parking fines for people parking their gasoline cars in the electric charging bays.
But you have to have the infrastructure in place to encourage people to buy the things rather than realise "oh 3 million people have electric cars. We should probably start installing charge points".
In the first year about half of them had never been used. The one that had seen the most use was outside the Department of Environment building (cos they owned and used an electric vehicle). And the biggest source of income from the charge points was in parking fines for people parking their gasoline cars in the electric charging bays.
But you have to have the infrastructure in place to encourage people to buy the things rather than realise "oh 3 million people have electric cars. We should probably start installing charge points".
I like the cars but the charging stations are a farce. I would even consider getting one as long as I have a gas car option in the garage for longer trips. People can charge at home. If Ontario wants to invest in this give people more grants who buy them and more grant money to install charging stations at their home.herman said:
herman
Well-known member
cabber24 said:
Are gas stations also a farce? They're kind of the reason cars are so convenient.
Like Arn said, infrastructure is needed before the demand reaches critical mass. Otherwise you get stuff like the Toronto subway system. I'd be happy to chip in the $1.47 on your behalf if it's still an issue for you.
bustaheims
Active member
cabber24 said:
These things don't require a ton of infrastructure. They can basically be installed in any existing parking lot. For example, a couple spots in a grocery store parking lot could host charging stations, so people can plug in their cars while the shop. They don't have to build a bunch of new lots, buildings, or anything like that to install these things. They can be integrated into the existing infrastructure.
Kin
New member
Arn said:
Yeah, that's interesting. I guess the issue here is that the drive for me from Toronto to my Cottage is roughly 100km further than the drive from Enniskillen to Bangor or Newry to Derry or whatever else might be a drive across most of Northern Ireland. So with all that space to cover you might hope this promotes the viability of the electric car for longer trips in a way you might not need to in a smaller country.
herman
Well-known member
bustaheims said:
A lot of newer complexes already have EV spots marked out exactly this way.
I'd love to see the cars (and roads) integrate more photovoltaic technology into their existing builds too, but they're currently quite slow and inefficient.
My dream would be induction charging while driving (some kind of crowd sourced magnetic induction generator built into the roads).
Frank E
Active member
Nik the Trik said:
That's not a compelling argument because it ignores the alternatives available for $40m.
The biggest offenders are the older vehicles (10 years + old) on the road, and I lean more toward incentives to get those vehicles off the road. The issue at hand is mainly the people that drive those vehicles don't generally have the money to drive newer less polluting vehicles.
Keep in mind, even newer gas vehicle emit at a rate that is a fraction of what new vehicles were emitting just 10 years ago.
Paris recently took action on older cars: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jul/02/paris-drives-old-cars-off-the-streets-in-push-to-improve-air-quality
herman
Well-known member
cabber24 said:
Driving an EV is not the same as driving a regular car. It takes forethought and more rigorous route planning. People have crossed America in a Tesla because they have juuuusst enough Superstations or motel EV chargers thanks to their population density. You can charge for as long as you need, or as long as you can afford to.
It's basically a 40 minute break for every 2ish hours of driving.
Frank E
Active member
Nik the Trik said:
Maybe, but as in other countries that have gone down this road, it doesn't really address the bigger source of the pollution.
Right now, electric vehicles are an expensive luxury that won't be mainstream for years, perhaps even never if fuel cell technology has some more breakthroughs in the coming decade. Spending money on a charging infrastructure that will likely be obsolete soon is not where I'd be spending money, especially given the state of the books of the province.
WhatIfGodWasALeaf
Active member
Frank, would your position change if every EV sold came with an extra $1000 dealership commision/taxbreak?
Kin
New member
Frank E said:
It's really not a maybe. This is part of a broader strategy and you're presenting a false dichotomy.
https://www.thestar.com/news/queenspark/2016/06/07/revealed-ontarios-climate-change-action-plan.html