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Similarly, EVs feel incredibly impractical for cramped city life. If you're living in a small London flat with no garage, parking etc. (hey!), the whole where a

by iamben 5y ago

Similarly, EVs feel incredibly impractical for cramped city life. If you're living in a small London flat with no garage, parking etc. (hey!), the whole where and how are you going to keep something charged is very real. I'm completely unsure how that's meant to be solved in a real and practical long term way.

TheDudeMan 5y ago
Streetside charging stations? They exist.
- iamben 5y ago
  You're right. I've just had a google and looked on https://www.zap-map.com/ https://www.zap-map.com/ - there's not enough though. But I stand by my original point - it's hard enough to find somewhere to park, never mind the parking spot next to the charger.
- leoedin 5y ago
  Long term this is probably the solution. Sort term though - the ratio of cars to street side charging is about 50 to 1 right now. Even if we put a charging socket in every existing lamppost we'd still only be at about 10:1. We basically need to dig up the streets of entire cities and lay additional high voltage cables and a charging point at every parking space. There doesn't seem to be any desire to do that right now.
dghlsakjg 5y ago
I don’t know about in London, but here in Canada a lot of businesses like grocery stores and movie theatres are realizing that charging stations are great for business. If you have a car in the city, you probably only need to charge once a week depending on usage, is it really that outlandish to think that in an entire week you won’t take your car somewhere with a charger nearby? Besides that, you can slow charge off mains voltage using an extension cord in many cars. We have wired every room in every building in every city across most of the globe to have electricity. I really don’t think it’s much of a stretch to run some extra wires to the curb as ecar adoption rises. The current system of moving billions of gallons of highly explosive liquids to custom built dispensing facilities placed every few kms on valuable real estate is far less practical when you think about it.
- iamben 5y ago
  > I really don’t think it’s much of a stretch to run some extra wires to the curb as ecar adoption rises. My flat is about ~50m from the road and 3 floors up. I absolutely get what you're saying, but charging from a cable inside the building isn't practical for anyone in this block (or many of the blocks nearby). Could agree more with regards to the explosive liquids - but you can be in and out of a petrol station in ~5 minutes. I may only need to charge once a week, but it still requires my car to be somewhere with a charging point for an hour (or whatever) a week. FWIW, I don't have an answer. I just don't think we're there (or close) yet. I suspect EV adoption will start outsides the cities and spread in.
  - dghlsakjg 5y ago
    The running the cable out to the curb was more meant as a municipal or collective effort. I don't think that running a cord from your window to your car is practical. More that the infrastructure to put a few charging stations on every block is already existent in every first world town and city. A government will instantly approve of a plan to install dozens of parking meters per block at a cost of thousands and thousands, and then employ an entire department to wander the city and enforce the rules. It really can't be that much harder to make it so that some of those meters also work as a charging station. I imagine as battery and charging tech progresses, the difference between getting petrol and charging a car will narrow to the point that it really doesn't matter. e.g. For the better part of a decade Tesla had been able to charge to 80% in ~30 min. That's more than enough for the average city dweller to get their shopping done. This is one area where I think techno-optimism is extremely warranted.
    - iamben 5y ago
      Yeah, I don't think we're disagreeing which each other. I'd assume eventually it will work exactly like you suggest - I just think we're very far from it right now. I see it very much chicken and egg - trying to encourage your local council to put charging points every 3 or 4 spaces on every street is going to be next to impossible when there's just not enough EVs; too much hassle/uncertainty to own an EV in the middle of a city if you have to park it on the street (and your charge options are super limited). That said, I'm sure it'll change and change will come quicker as more people in the suburbs (with the space to charge at home) buy.

by iamben 5y ago

TheDudeMan 5y ago

Streetside charging stations? They exist.

iamben 5y ago
You're right. I've just had a google and looked on https://www.zap-map.com/ https://www.zap-map.com/ - there's not enough though. But I stand by my original point - it's hard enough to find somewhere to park, never mind the parking spot next to the charger.
leoedin 5y ago
Long term this is probably the solution. Sort term though - the ratio of cars to street side charging is about 50 to 1 right now. Even if we put a charging socket in every existing lamppost we'd still only be at about 10:1. We basically need to dig up the streets of entire cities and lay additional high voltage cables and a charging point at every parking space. There doesn't seem to be any desire to do that right now.

dghlsakjg 5y ago

I don’t know about in London, but here in Canada a lot of businesses like grocery stores and movie theatres are realizing that charging stations are great for business. If you have a car in the city, you probably only need to charge once a week depending on usage, is it really that outlandish to think that in an entire week you won’t take your car somewhere with a charger nearby? Besides that, you can slow charge off mains voltage using an extension cord in many cars. We have wired every room in every building in every city across most of the globe to have electricity. I really don’t think it’s much of a stretch to run some extra wires to the curb as ecar adoption rises. The current system of moving billions of gallons of highly explosive liquids to custom built dispensing facilities placed every few kms on valuable real estate is far less practical when you think about it.

iamben 5y ago
> I really don’t think it’s much of a stretch to run some extra wires to the curb as ecar adoption rises. My flat is about ~50m from the road and 3 floors up. I absolutely get what you're saying, but charging from a cable inside the building isn't practical for anyone in this block (or many of the blocks nearby). Could agree more with regards to the explosive liquids - but you can be in and out of a petrol station in ~5 minutes. I may only need to charge once a week, but it still requires my car to be somewhere with a charging point for an hour (or whatever) a week. FWIW, I don't have an answer. I just don't think we're there (or close) yet. I suspect EV adoption will start outsides the cities and spread in.
- dghlsakjg 5y ago
  The running the cable out to the curb was more meant as a municipal or collective effort. I don't think that running a cord from your window to your car is practical. More that the infrastructure to put a few charging stations on every block is already existent in every first world town and city. A government will instantly approve of a plan to install dozens of parking meters per block at a cost of thousands and thousands, and then employ an entire department to wander the city and enforce the rules. It really can't be that much harder to make it so that some of those meters also work as a charging station. I imagine as battery and charging tech progresses, the difference between getting petrol and charging a car will narrow to the point that it really doesn't matter. e.g. For the better part of a decade Tesla had been able to charge to 80% in ~30 min. That's more than enough for the average city dweller to get their shopping done. This is one area where I think techno-optimism is extremely warranted.
  - iamben 5y ago
    Yeah, I don't think we're disagreeing which each other. I'd assume eventually it will work exactly like you suggest - I just think we're very far from it right now. I see it very much chicken and egg - trying to encourage your local council to put charging points every 3 or 4 spaces on every street is going to be next to impossible when there's just not enough EVs; too much hassle/uncertainty to own an EV in the middle of a city if you have to park it on the street (and your charge options are super limited). That said, I'm sure it'll change and change will come quicker as more people in the suburbs (with the space to charge at home) buy.