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I was thinking that Tesla flubbed it with the v3 Supercharger rollout. These older stations are 120 kW, but what’s more is that they are paired so that’s a maximum shared between two vehicles which means that a crowded older supercharging station just gets worse and further compounds the problem. The v3 supercharger is a dedicated 250 kW max per stall, so that’s something like 4x the throughput, but Tesla didn’t seem to have a really good plan B for if the rollout of the v3 supercharger didn’t hit its intended schedule—which it didn’t. Yea, it’s a holiday weekend and there are a lot more days of the year that aren’t holiday weekends, but that also means it’s a particularly important day for people. Teslas, especially in California, are selling well, so it does seem like the company really needs to put in a lot more resources in both establishing more stations and converting older stations into v3. After all, they’re planning to launch a crossover with a large number of reservations, so this will only get worse unless they seriously accelerate the expansion of v3 superchargers.
The profits for public utilities across the country in almost all cases is set by the state they are servicing, their profits are somewhere around 10% which is inline with other utilities. Profits taken by investors is no excuse for the poor infrastructure especially given the high rates consumers in CA pay compared to utilities in other states that are managing this with lower rates.
Not all companies give out large shareholder dividends, and they were doing it in a time when profits should have been reinvested into their product—ie their transmission lines. This was ultimately a disastrous company policy, not just in the actual disaster that happened, but also because they are now facing bankruptcy which could have been avoided had they actually bolstered rather than slash their tree trimming and monitoring activities. Instead of trimming trees in a time when there had been numerous droughts, they trimmed their tree-trimming budget while giving out large shareholder dividends. Did you take a look at the links? These aren’t back of the envelope, out of the ass things I’m saying—these are actual acts of verified negligence. In that, I agree that profits are a poor excuse, because this is negligence that ultimately tanks the company as well.
What a weird rant. Blocked charging stations are a big problem, just like blocked gas pumps. Superchargers are the only ones that actually get it right- I can't tell you how many public charging stations I've seen blocked by entitled EV owners who think it's fair for them to park there even when they don't need to charge. I wish the fines were higher. And I wish the charging station had cameras so they could fine everyone who isn't even plugged in- EV and ICE alike.
People in this world are so selfish. "I should be allowed to block a charging station if I want to". Don't you see how that sounds?
I would advocate for fines during the seconds that exactly 0 spaces were available, but accept no less. I also have a slight problem with those fines going back into Tesla's pocket.
It's a slippery slope for Tesla to FINE their OWN customers whom they proclaim to serve. If local gov't wants to regulate and police EV spaces like handicap spots, then let them. But I'll be --- if the same company that sold me my vehicle decides to then assess a fine for using their service in a way that they - very arbitrarily - don't approve.
It would be like moving into a development with a very strict HOA. You own the home, and you are fined for something like "leaving your garage door open" or "leaving a car parked outside the garage past X hour". It doesn't matter if such fines are legal. The bad taste it leaves will send just as many customers running for alternatives as are adopting EV's for the first time.
Then, they'll have to impress shareholders with "ICE customers converted" instead of "net adds"
There's no doubt that the charging speed can use improvement, and the charging network can use expansion. Having said that, for most daily driving, you can charge the car overnight, at home, conveniently and at low cost. Tesla only began building out the supercharger network in 2012. They have over 1600 supercharger stations in North America and are up to version 3 on the supercharging technology - that's evolution in the last 7 years. Based on past performance, I don't think it's going to take another 20 years for things to improve.
Looks like a flintstone station.... Or was it designed with that in mind???
The charging station is at the entrance to the Madonna Inn, a very historic hotel & spa - https://www.madonnainn.com/ - that arch is the entrance structure. Much of the place is built like that, very whimsical - for example, the men's room has a waterfall in it. My in-laws used to live near there.
I would advocate for fines during the seconds that exactly 0 spaces were available, but accept no less. I also have a slight problem with those fines going back into Tesla's pocket.
It's a slippery slope for Tesla to FINE their OWN customers whom they proclaim to serve. If local gov't wants to regulate and police EV spaces like handicap spots, then let them. But I'll be --- if the same company that sold me my vehicle decides to then assess a fine for using their service in a way that they - very arbitrarily - don't approve.
It would be like moving into a development with a very strict HOA. You own the home, and you are fined for something like "leaving your garage door open" or "leaving a car parked outside the garage past X hour". It doesn't matter if such fines are legal. The bad taste it leaves will send just as many customers running for alternatives as are adopting EV's for the first time.
Then, they'll have to impress shareholders with "ICE customers converted" instead of "net adds"
I still don't see why you're advocating for leaving your car blocking something that others may want to use. It's really the strangest position I've seen.
But honestly I'm glad you're here defending your position- every time I see someone so selfishly blocking charging stations (my local train station has 5 and they are perfectly, 100% blocked every day since people don't want to pay to charge but want the preferential parking), I wonder to myself "nobody actually thinks this is ok, right?".
And the concept of only charging a fee when every other stall is taken is a farce. Charging stations are like gas pumps- sometimes one or two aren't working. Maybe someone accidentally ran over the charging handle, or one has a technical difficulty, maybe one has a huge puddle that nobody wants to step in, and sometimes they are angled such that only certain cars can fit but others can't. Why is it so crazy to think that someone should only use charging stations... for charging?
And how in the world is it "very arbitrar[y]" to assess a fine for not charging at a charging station? With a Tesla, you have a display on the car and on your phone that says how long charging will take right when you plug in, and it constantly updates on the app. "Your car will be done charging in 35 minutes". Ok great, I'll come back out in 35 minutes. Was that so painful?
We have 9 stalls at my office. 9. And we have signs that say "please move your car after 4 hours or when charging is finished, whichever is shorter". (These are slower level 2 chargers). This is so everyone can have some juice. Yet every day, there are entitled PHEV owners who need to charge for 1 hour and leave their car connected for 9 hours. A few only do it one time then never again after someone leaves a note, but a couple see the note and think "hmmf, right this second there is an open charging stall, so there must be an empty charing stall all day, and therefore I don't have to spend 3 minutes to take the elevator downstairs to move my car 6 feet". Of course, that stall fills up right after he leaves and he blocks people from charging for the rest of the day.
Anyway, I think I get it- you are more important than everyone else so you should be allowed to block others from charging. I'll just say that as a Tesla owner, I LOVE the fines. They explicitly state that they hope to make ZERO dollars from the fines, but unfortunately, they make quite a bit off of them. And that's unfortunate.
I still don't see why you're advocating for leaving your car blocking something that others may want to use. It's really the strangest position I've seen.
But honestly I'm glad you're here defending your position- every time I see someone so selfishly blocking charging stations (my local train station has 5 and they are perfectly, 100% blocked every day since people don't want to pay to charge but want the preferential parking), I wonder to myself "nobody actually thinks this is ok, right?".
And the concept of only charging a fee when every other stall is taken is a farce. Charging stations are like gas pumps- sometimes one or two aren't working. Maybe someone accidentally ran over the charging handle, or one has a technical difficulty, maybe one has a huge puddle that nobody wants to step in, and sometimes they are angled such that only certain cars can fit but others can't. Why is it so crazy to think that someone should only use charging stations... for charging?
And how in the world is it "very arbitrar[y]" to assess a fine for not charging at a charging station? With a Tesla, you have a display on the car and on your phone that says how long charging will take right when you plug in, and it constantly updates on the app. "Your car will be done charging in 35 minutes". Ok great, I'll come back out in 35 minutes. Was that so painful?
We have 9 stalls at my office. 9. And we have signs that say "please move your car after 4 hours or when charging is finished, whichever is shorter". (These are slower level 2 chargers). This is so everyone can have some juice. Yet every day, there are entitled PHEV owners who need to charge for 1 hour and leave their car connected for 9 hours. A few only do it one time then never again after someone leaves a note, but a couple see the note and think "hmmf, right this second there is an open charging stall, so there must be an empty charing stall all day, and therefore I don't have to spend 3 minutes to take the elevator downstairs to move my car 6 feet". Of course, that stall fills up right after he leaves and he blocks people from charging for the rest of the day.
Anyway, I think I get it- you are more important than everyone else so you should be allowed to block others from charging. I'll just say that as a Tesla owner, I LOVE the fines. They explicitly state that they hope to make ZERO dollars from the fines, but unfortunately, they make quite a bit off of them. And that's unfortunate.
Stop, stop! You're giving me too much material! LOL
What do you think is the safer bet - assuming that at least one charger isn't working, or that all 9 are? Is this the expected standard that at least 11% of given Supercharging lanes are out of service at any given time? Furthermore, you want to CHARGE your OWN CUSTOMERS under this assumption???
It takes about 7 minutes of my time to walk across my floor, take the stairs (or elevator) down, walk out to the parking deck to the nearest EV station. Why would I want to make (what basically amounts to) a 15-minute round trip out of MY lunch break to move my car? This is predatory, and (in my case) ChargePoint wants to continue to charge $/kWh after it's full and no longer supplying electricity. Ours is $0.01/min but same principle. They KNOW this will be smack in the middle of someone's work day.
Regarding "Tesla hopes they make $0 from the fines" they claim that... while wiping their tears away with $100 bills! Don't say you don't want it, then set up avenues to automatically start revenue flows based off of customers' INACTION, in a scheming "gotcha" setup. Please!
Those of us who live here know to fill our tanks (and a couple of 5gal gas containers) before the hurricane warning is ever issued.
These are not the same people “in the know” who are waiting in that long Home Depot line, buying plywood, the day before the hurricane arrives, are they?
These are not the same people “in the know” who are waiting in that long Home Depot line, buying plywood, the day before the hurricane arrives, are they?
Absolutely not!
In our little town, a well known attorney went to Lowe's and bought up all the generators and gave them to "the needy" (his buddies) just in time for an ice storm to knock out people's power for 1-2 weeks. Ironically, people with underground power had the longest wait for power to be restored.
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