Charging Station Protocol?

Now I realize why the 20 or so charging spots at my local Target is situated in the middle of the parking lot a good distance away from store entrance. I guess it is so smug SUV drivers don't get upset at smug EV drivers who take up the closest parking spots. Makes sense, I've never seen those spots occupied by anything but EV and PHEV. However, at the Fry's location, 1 of the 4 charging spots closest to store entrance is often occupied by an ICE vehicle.

Planners should take note of this when installing charging stations. I don't mind walking.

 

What about disabled plug in drivers ... you think retailers will want to go to the added expense of wiring up two separate locations?
SGH-I717R ? 2

 

Our locale IKEA store has about 10 parking spots reserved for Hybrids and EVs close to the front door. Every time I go there it was always occupied by ICE only vehicles.

 

I wish more of the spots were in the back and less conspicuous. Plus it is more efficient to park out back so you don't have to fight traffic/pedestrians driving in and out.

I think most places don't do this because they have to run power further out.

 

That's the run around bullshit answer. I'm wondering if cities and business get a green credit from the government to install the EV spots, then care very little after installation on whether or not they are used.

Thus, they cannot be used because they are always ICEd. This was my biggest fear when deciding whether or not to buy pure EV or PHEV. Thus, I went with PHEV.

 

I like the charging station etiquette amongst EV/PHEV owners. There is this community charger in Santa Monica. Its a free, always on, level II box right where a parking meter used to be. Graciously installed by the city. Needless to say its usually occupied.

Yesterday I returned to my car after about 90 minutes and saw a silver Leaf parked behind me with the charge port open, and thanks to this thread I knew to plug the Leaf in. When I got in the car I saw the driver had left me a typed message on a strip of paper asking to plug in the Leaf behind me. I guess he relies on this strategy a lot.

There is a RAV4 spot right behing the EV plug spot, I will have to see if I can reached the prius port from the RAV4 spot and make some little notes to plug me in. I think its cool system, I enjoy this community stuff.

 

The solution is continued communication and education to get charging spots more conspicuously marked. I suggest you ask the people in charge of the lot to paint or stripe the spots green or yellow.

The California law requires specific signage in order for a spot to be enforced as a tow-away zone.

I had a similar problem in the San Rafael, CA parking garages. Two of the garages each have two free charger spots. In one garage the spots are signed and yellow striped and there is never a problem. In the other garage, one charger is between two spots right next to the entrance, one a handicapped spot. The other spot has usually been occupied by a non-electric car.

The problem in California is that there is no statewide standard for charging stations. Each jurisdiction makes up its own rules. They felt that one charging station of the four needed to be reserved for handicapped only.

Other jurisdictions have coped with handicapped access by making one spot accessible, but not marking it as handicapped reserved. San Rafael has had issues with rampant ADA lawsuits against downtown merchants so perhaps they were playing it safe. They did recognize the problem and mark the spot as four hour limited parking, but that didn't help.

Last week I noticed that the four hour sign had been replaced with an Electric Vehicle Charging Station sign, probably in response to my complaints and education efforts. It was available both times I tried so far.

 

Adam, where is this charger spot? Is it posted on plugshare.com? I am always looking for a charge spot in Santa Monica, but everything is always full.

 

Yes it is on plugshare. Its on Montana between 12th and 11th on the north side. There are also free city chargers at the civic center on 4th and olympic. And at the 3rd street promenade are a few chargepoint stations as well as one always-on santa monica owned charger.

Edit: And between 3:45pm and 5:30pm, M-F is the time period I usually am looking to park there.

 

Just got this from Blink
https://www.blinknetwork.com/file/7741/Blink+Courtesy+Notices.pdf

Couldn't the EV itself have an RFID tag so that: 1. driver wouldn't need to touch the Blink card, and 2. if a car lacking a RFID pulls into the slot a loud voice repeats endlessly in a monotone, "there is no parking or waiting on the airport drive", er, "please move your car to another stall or be towed".

 

RFID is usually only good for a couple of inches. Maybe a camera with some vehicle/license plate recognition capabilities or simply an annoying audible "BEEP BEEP BEEP - PLUG IN REQUIRED - BEEP BEEP BEEP" every time any vehicle pulls into the spot, until it plugs in.

 

touchy are we?

 

maybe so ... just pulled into a whole foods with 500Wh left and a supersized SUV right in front of me pulls into the charge station spot and the driver jumps out and looks at me with my blinker on waiting to pull into the spot. The driver avoids eye contact and acts distracted so I open the car door, all of a sudden he must have forgot something and goes back to the SUV, backs out and parks in another spot.


He sees me at the counter just now and stops to say hi and asks what it is like to drive a Volt. Now he is thinking it might work for his daughter.

 

awwwww, you made a friend

 

I gave up going to my "free" ChargePoint station down the street because Volt's have taken over the time's I want to charge. So I just connect my EVSE at my apartment and wait for the lights to come on. (of course, I'm in my apartment on the 14th floor watching the news while it's charging) I go outside two hours and 34 minutes later to put the EVSE back into my trunk. No more sitting in the car while it's charging at 1.5 hours ( or in the case of a Volt occupying the L2 slot, 2.34 hours)

 

Huh? The Volt is a L2 4 hour charge from empty, not 2.34 hours. If there was an available upgrade from the 3.3kw charger to a 6.6 or 7.2, it would be well worth it in my opinion.

Most of my chargepoint stations aren't "free", but they are pretty close at $0.14/day for unlimited charging. I have a sign in my windshield that gives permission to be unplugged if someone needs a charge, and I just ask that they plug me back in afterwards. I get a txt when someone unplugs me, so no surprises so far.

I got a full charge this evening downtown while I was visiting friends for dinner. Today was a little unusual, about 100 miles today, all EV.

 

Sorry for the mis-understanding, when a Volt is occupying the L2 slot, I'm stuck at the 120 volt slot, hence 2.34 hours for me to charge up