Electric cars

buglawton

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Thanks, but that didn't answer the question. Do non disabled users fill those disabled spaces or do they respect them?

Also as seen in that supermarket carpark I posted some time back (forgotten the link now) they had 40 chargers serving 160 spaces, so that helps too.

In reality going forward, as more EV's are sold, more EV spaces will be needed and it will become a self fixing issue. As with the rollout of all new technology we will of course hear how it won't work because ........ but I'm sure that these doom and gloom predictions for EV's will fail to arrive, just like all the doom and gloom predictions of the past.

Today I saw all 6 disability parking bays empty, in an otherwise 95% full Aldi car park. I'm not sure though what your point is in doggedly following this point.

buglawton

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Yet more Ade predictions. Your finger tips must be getting tired from hanging on in there.

IC sales will collapse long before 2040.

I tend to agree with you and fortuitously this year had my front garden converted into a paved area for 2 cars. Plus I'm happy to use apps etc to seek out clever long distance routes that include appropriate charging stops.

All the same I'll wait for MG to produce an all-EV made in China with somewhat Kona specs but at an actually democratic price point and availability/delivery time.

Still I feel sorry as previously mentioned for the driveway have-nots and this pushes any chance of downsizing the house as I drift into retirement far into the long grass.

Where... is... the... government... policy?

Martyn1981

buglawton wrote: »

Today I saw all 6 disability parking bays empty, in an otherwise 95% full Aldi car park. I'm not sure though what your point is in doggedly following this point.

Sorry, I thought it was really obvious, and assumed that you also thought it was obvious by the way you were avoiding a straight answer, but on reading back perhaps it wasn't clear what my point was. You were saying that all spaces would have to have chargers as the car parks are always full.

So from your notes today at Aldi, the 'specialist' spaces are being respected, and the car park isn't full. So it seems that the problem you were suggesting isn't a real problem, so long as folk respect EV spaces. Cheers.

buglawton

As if Aldi or any other business is going to add a series of EV-reserved spaces in a crowded car park that's nearly always full. Thus removing precious spaces from general motorists who don't happen to need a charge.

Range-anxious EV drivers without their own driveways turning up with no idea in advance if they'll be able to charge or not at one of a handful of such reserved spaces. That's an idea that 'ain't gonna fly'.

Maybe a supermarket manager would like to comment?

System

buglawton wrote: »

As if Aldi or any other business is going to add a series of EV-reserved spaces in a crowded car park that's nearly always full. Thus removing precious spaces from general motorists who don't happen to need a charge.

A Lidl in Scarborough has. Only two spaces but it is a start.

buglawton

Interesting. There seem to be several types of incompatible fast charging systems and different payment schemes you need to belong to. How does Lidl cope with the variety?

AdrianC

Lidl don't. Several of their parking spaces are outsourced - in the case of Scarborough, to Pod Point.
https://pod-point.com/products/commercial-charging


https://goo.gl/maps/U7ohPiQr8SM2
Seems to be two parking spaces for a single EV charge point, with three sockets, out of 80+ general parking spaces with 6 disabled. It's currently set to be free of charge, controlled by a smartphone app, but PodPoint have the capability of charging.

https://open.pod-point.com/address/lidl-scarborough-seamer-road-j9y1/tony-lucy

Martyn1981

buglawton wrote: »

As if Aldi or any other business is going to add a series of EV-reserved spaces in a crowded car park that's nearly always full. Thus removing precious spaces from general motorists who don't happen to need a charge.

Sorry but that argument doesn't follow. If the charging spaces are added proportionately to EV ownership over time, then for every precious space removed from general motorists, you will also have a 'general motorist' removed by switching to EV's. You have to look at both sides of the issue for balance.

But regardless, based on your statements, we seem to have responsible motorists respecting 'specialist' spaces and still 5% of general spaces free, so there doesn't seem to be a problem:

Let's assume a carpark of 106 spaces, with 6 disabled spaces (you mentioned 6 disabled spaces empty, I'll assume all are empty, but of course you can change the numbers to 107 & 7 disabled spaces and 1 full etc if you want).

So we have 100 'free' spaces, 95 full (95%), 5 cars arriving/leaving and a buffer of 5 spaces. Now let's assume that 3% of folk buy an EV and 3 spaces are switched to EV only, then we have 95 spaces in use, 92 IC and 3 EV, 5 cars still arriving/leaving, and 5 empty buffer spaces.

But, back to reality, as I mentioned before, the addition of a charging point at the center of 4 spaces, such as the 40 charger / 160 space example, helps deal with this issue even better, and both the provision of such spaces and later on the ratio of 1:4 can be increased as EV ownership and supermarket charging demand rises.

In short (sorry, too late) this seems to just be the usual fear of something new and the 'bloke down the pub' creation of problems that never come to anything in reality.

buglawton wrote: »

Range-anxious EV drivers without their own driveways turning up with no idea in advance if they'll be able to charge or not at one of a handful of such reserved spaces. That's an idea that 'ain't gonna fly'.

Maybe a supermarket manager would like to comment?

Or perhaps it's a fictional scenario that 'a'int gonna fly'?

buglawton

So with my Aldi disabled bay example in post #2782, just due to the statistics of the moment, 6 spaces were wasted while at the same time me and other motorists were cruising round seeking out an empty space. I toured the whole car park, found a space and would estimate there were about 5 non disabled spaces free though some drivers were awaiting another car to leave a space.

Now imagine 6 more bays were allocated for actively charging EVs only but again, due to the statistics of random demand, they're not occupied. That's a borderline full car park now overflowing.

And again due to the stats, on another day 10 disabled drivers/mums with infants might rock up at the same moment and will be competing for 6 spaces. That's my EV analogy.

This is the same resource allocation conundrum the NHS faces with specialist vs general hospital wards and is exactly why unisex wards were experimented with.

Not an issue where land is cheap and car parks half empty but my observations in Berks are that supermarket car parks are very frequently absolutely full.

AdrianC

The whole disabled-space analogy falls down on one major difference.

NOBODY chooses to be disabled.