New California Law on use of EV charging stations

And I suppose the Prius driver shouldn't have purchased a PiP if they need to stop at a gas station to get home...?

The PiP driver can go to a gas station to add energy to his or her car.

The Leaf driver can't.

Seems pretty obvious to me.

Remember the cellular phoney, back when in-car cellular phones were hot in the early 90s? It was simply a fake antenna that could be glued to the car's window, just like the high rollers had.

Like that.

 

Why are people hating on the government? The only spots this will apply to are government spots (municipal/public), no one is going to tell owners of parking garages and lots how to manage their businesses. If you don't like standing in line for the government cheese go buy a sandwich.

This isn't the government interfering with you, its people complaining about how the government chooses to operate their chargers.

 

For some it'll always be GM's fault. Or the government's. Or both.

 

Sadly, you no NOT need a fake charger. The wording is so poorly written in the law, that you could literally have your RV parked in an EV charge spot ... as long as a battery tender is plugged in. That's right ... all it say is 'plugged in for charging'. The old law required an 'EV' sticker, and the motor vehicle department issued them to EV's. Somehow, I guess that was too complex for our simple minds, and so we had to re-invent the wheel, regardless of whether the old system worked just fine.

In this case, The government and GM is the same thing. Not that I'm suggesting that this means the deck will always be stacked. Of course not.

 

This includes private chargers in public places like shopping centers.

certainly the requirement of stickers is just silly beurocratic non-sense which is comon in california law. GM trying to get rid of bad verbage opened it up, and the bill proponents just stunk it up.

Here is chelsea sextons take
GM to CA Volt drivers: “Oops, we did it again.” « evchels

but my big problem is this

So who is responsible?

So yes this is the fault of the California government, helped along with gm, and opposed by plug-in america. Its a place where government was in a position to remove a problem, but instead is creating a bigger one.

 

I haven't read this iteration, but the old sticker law only applied to chargers where the proper EV-only signage was posted, otherwise the law did not apply, and my understanding was (from second forum reading living here on the East Coast) that most private landowners did not post the signs.

Besides I think you're comment is mixed up, a shopping center, while open to the public is private property, and a private charger wouldn't need to be made available to the public at all. Perhaps you meant public chargers in private places, but that seems wrong too.

 

One and the same these days.

Tom

 

Small communities tend to be far more cooperative than large ones. In the 90's there were very few EVs. It was a small community of dedicated, idealistic folks. As the number of EVs grows, and "ordinary" people start driving them, I promise you, the spirit of cooperation will diminish, and individuals (not all, but enough) will convince themselves that they "need" the charge more than the guy who is plugged in ahead of them.

It really makes no sense to spend several thousand dollars installing a charger that someone will use for 3 or 4 hours of the three weeks they are parked in the space.

It would make more sense at airports to have an entire separate lot (with appropriate fees) where every space has a 120-volt, 15-amp outlet. If you're parking at the airport you don't need L2 charging. And in cold climates, even ICE drivers might want to plug in block heaters. Charge for the service and let anyone who wants to pay plug in.

Exactly!!! Driving an EV is not an excuse to occupy a charging space, unless you are charging. (With an appropriate time allowance so you don't have to return at the exact moment the car is full.)

Stinky dumpster, no! But do put the chargers at the far end of the parking lot (except for a limited number of handicapped charging spaces) so that owning an EV does not confer preferential parking.

 

I assume that this new law only applies to places with proper signage, but if you go to the expense of putting in a charger, why would you not want to keep spaces open for charging. Now that there are more plug-ins, these spots being "iced" will be more of a problem. I'm not sure how many places other than california had a sticker program for enforcing these things. It is the towing enforcement that I am against. Using a plug in parking spot to charge a car makes more sense than using a spot because the state issued you a sticker because you bought a state sanctioned car.

I am not sure what the proper verbiage is. A shopping mall parking lot is a public place and has the laws of public places at least here in Texas. Call it what you will but these chargers on privately owned land and open to the public in marked spaces are part of the law in California. Since California is often copied on these things, a bad law there may be carried over to other states.

I wish to get away from this strange labeling. GM is partially owned by the federal government. The federal government is not involved with this state politicizing in this case. The California government is the responsible party. In many ways the government is unduly influenced to pass laws against its citizens because of corporate influence. So not the same, this is government corruption (state of California) partially by corporate influence (GM). I don't think the law is in the interest of GM or the state of California, but may be in the interest of a small group of politicians that want to grow government and parking space enforcement. It would not take much to simply amend the old law to include plug in cars that use a traction battery, instead of adding this new penalty that anti plug in people can use.

 

Placing charging spaces at the far end of a parking lot may be difficult if there is no power/electricity running to the far ends of the parking lot. I may be uninformed, but if I were being asked to install chargers at an office building/shopping center that I owned, and I had to dig up the parking lot to run power out to the far end of the parking lot, I'd probably be less inclined to do so.

 

GM Sponsors Bill That Creates Problems for Electric Car Charging | PluginCars.com

I'm don't think most states recognize access to chargers as part of ADA, but it appears California does. I would be happy to be corrected. I know that the spots I've seen in Texas are close in, but not marked handicapped.

 

Charging spots should only be used for cars that need a charge. Once the car is charged, another vehicle owner ought to be able to unplug the cord and use it, if it'll reach. But the first car's owner shouldn't have to go back and move their car until they're ready.

So - assuming a charger can serve several adjacent spots - each spot should have an indicator light. When the car pulls in, a pavement sensor turns the light red. When they plug in and take a charge, it goes yellow (as long as the car really can use the charge - otherwise it stays red). Full charge - green. Unplug - still green until the car leaves. Unplug before it goes green - flashing yellow, so if another car filches the cord they will be suitably embarassed.

Light red - ticket the car. Light green - car's legal to stay there, but someone else can use the cord.

Tweak - if it's a time-limited parking zone, the light goes red at the end of the time limit. Oh, and if there's a charger cord available for a vacant spot, it shows green too.

 

Hilton Garden Inn in Waldorf MD has two chargers, and one is for a handicapped spot. When I checked in they told me I could use either as no one else ever had, I am not handicapped. I did not use the handicapped EV charging spot, but it raised the question in my mind how often that prime spot (the other was farther away) would get used.

Did they have to be handicapped and driving an EV? How small of a population group that must be.

 

"Did they have to be handicapped and driving an EV? How small of a population group that must be."

Not everyone who is handicapped needs a van to carry a wheelchair. My PiP will have a state-issued handicapped license plate, due to my wife's medical condition. I plan to charge it at home, but under some circumstances could see myself using one of those public charging/handicapped spots, provided she was with me.

 

Maybe I was not clear:

I think nobody is going to park at a charger, plug their car in until it has a half a charge, then come out and unplug it but leave it parked at the charger while they go off to do other errands. Thus an EV at a charger but not plugged in was probably not unplugged by the owner, and therefore should not be towed for violation.

They'll unplug their car when they are ready to drive away, which may be before the car is full, or may be hours after it has finished charging. But the latter occupies a space someone else could be using to charge, so leaving a car for an excessive amount of time after charging is complete should not be allowed.

It's a complicated issue. I'm just glad it does not affect me, since I don't need public charging and there isn't any public charging to speak of in Spokane (2 or 3 120-v. 15-a. outlets, pretty worthless).

 

austingreen - by state sanctioned, do you mean RAV4-EV, Leaf, S-10ev, iMiev, Tesla, etc? ... If I remember right (at least in CA), anyone with an EV (home brew or factory) could get a sticker. Home brews simply had to go through the gymnastics of showing their registration had been changed over from ICE to EV. Back in the day, I'd seen a 914 as well as a Miata (sp?) with the CA EV stickers (no exhaust pipe too).

That said, and for anyone who cares - here's the law in CA (posted so every one will quit saying, "I think the law says such & such") showing before, and the proposed amendment(s), that unfortunately got ram-roded through:

http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/11-12/bill/asm/ab_0451-0500/ab_475_bill_20110907_chaptered.pdf

As written (and as I stated in in my prior post), and written sloppily, without stickers, all you have to be is 'charging'. Thus, an RV can snag the parking spot (typically premium because many charge stations are up front for the disabled) and use the RV's battery tender - hooked up to an L1
port is good to go. You gotta laugh.

 

You are right. Unlike what I said earlier, I can see a Leaf driver purchasing a car with the assumption that they can rely on a charge at work to get home. I personally would not buy one (and that's what I should have said earlier) unless I was quite certain there would always be a spot available for me to charge my Leaf.

I still see no reason why a PiP should not park and charge if a spot is available. I certainly would not park for an extended period of time (I'd move my car when charged) and would gladly let some unfortunate stranded Leaf driver charge if necessary. I just think that the intent of the charging locations is to promote EV driving. Whether that is getting more people to buy Leafs, Volts, or PiPs, it is a good thing. Anyone owning one, getting around without using gas would be good in my book.

 

I assumed it was the same as the hov stickers where the car needed to be on a list approved. Some conversion companies are on the list, but home brew EVs are not. This may be different for the sticker for charging, but I doubt its as simple as walking into an office and showing registration. I know that phev owners got letters rejecting them because the hybrid was not compressed natural gas which would make it zev according the the CDMV and eligible for a sticker. But further the old law was EV only, which makes no sense to me. Why not allow plug in conversions and manufactured plug-in cars use the charger. These are needed to avoid the chicken and egg problem. Shouldn't the prius-phv, c-max energi, and volt as well as joe blows 20kwh prius conversion be able to use the chargers? That said the bill started amending this then went way overboard by forcing localities to pass laws to allow for charge sharing, and allowing the towing of cars that have been unplugged even if the vehicles owner had nothing to do with the unplugging.

I don't think that is much of a problem, but again it should not be in the bill. It should be used for vehicles charging the motive battery, and perhaps a minimum size, say 4kwh should be included.

+1

absolutely, lets get a charging infrastructure built and support all the plug in vehicles, even those with smaller batteries and an ice. Arbitrarily excluding phevs or non sulev phevs might stop a 150 mile EREV with a small inefficient generator from recharging.