Neither I nor the article is arguing that Tesla's entire battery swap program was just a scheme to get tax incentives. It likely was good faith, and there may

Neither I nor the article is arguing that Tesla's entire battery swap program was just a scheme to get tax incentives. It likely was good faith, and there may have been good reasons for Tesla to end the program. The point is that that particular swap station was not in good faith, and therefore it's (predictable) non-use gives you no additional data about the public's demand for swapping. (You may, of course, infer something from the fact that Tesla doesn't think it's viable.) It has to do with the way the incentive structure is set up: there is tax credit of order $1,000 per vehicle if the vehicle has battery swap capabilities, which necessitates "available" infrastructure. If Tesla invested huge in battery swap tech and then decided it wasn't going to work, they still have massive incentives to open up a single, highly inconvenient swap station in order to recoup part of their investment through the tax incentive.