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Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

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Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#371

Post by stevesimmons »

quicklyfrozen wrote: post #336
stevesimmons wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I cycled to work for years in the Netherlands (down to -5C in winter) and Australia (frequenctly 35C+ in summer). The secret in both cases is: (i) keep appropriate clothes at the office; (ii) wear suitable cycling gear (as the Dutch say, there's no such thing as unsuitable weather, only unsuitable clothing); (iii) find a way to shower at work; (iv) be good humored when weather or other mishaps occur...

-5C isn't particularly cold. Would you have been out in -20C with gusty winds and drifting snow? How do I get those appropriate clothes to the office, and where do I store them? Can't be all wrinkled -- and these days you may not even have an assigned desk. And I can be good humored, but will my boss be? Really, though, if we consider bikes safe enough for transportation, why can't we have ultralight enclosed EVs?

(i) nope, I'm not crazy; (ii) in your Ortlieb bike pannier or backpack; (iii) commandeer a cupboard in a quiet corner; (iv) if your boss isn't good humored, it's time to change jobs, or change the boss; (v) because they blow away in a strong wind.

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#372

Post by dylan604 »

mumblemumble wrote: post #215
whatshisface wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have to add "redesigned cities" to that list. Electric vehicles are almost as much a patch for ICE cities as they are a replacement for internal combustion.

I don't think most actual cities would need to be wholesale redesigned; plenty of urban planners have proposed plenty of incremental ways to successfully re-tool cities to favor humans over automobiles. And it has successfully happened in the past - see Amsterdam, for example, or (admittedly to a lesser extent) Montréal.

I would love to see a city in the Western parts of the US accomplish this mainly because of how difficult of a task it would be. The majority of people live >15 miles from downtown areas. Mass transpo can only be generously described as an after thought. I've played SimCity, and if you did not place your subway/train/bus stops efficiently, the citizens did not use them. That plays out in real life as well, except it is much more difficult in real life to just break out the bulldozer to re-engineer the city to make it more mass transpo friendly.

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#373

Post by dragonwriter »

dylan604 wrote: post #366
nextos wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some cities in mainland Europe are like this already. They make cars unnecessary. Even bikes, as you can walk everywhere. I'm talking about midsized cities (100-300k inhabitants) that are really compact thanks to 4-8 levels in every apartment block and ubiquitous use of lifts. Lifts are the disruptive technology. They make energetically efficient cities possible and cheap. I also find these cities much more nice to l…

>Lifts are the disruptive technology. They make energetically efficient cities possible and cheap. Are lifts really as efficient as escalators? An escalator is constantly moving (unless it's malfunctioning), so there is no wait to continue moving. An elevator on the other hand is not. Maybe it depends on the number of floors? I can see an elevator being faster going from ground to floor 40 rather than zig zagging flo…

> Are lifts really as efficient as escalators?

I wouldn't be surprised.

> An escalator is constantly moving (unless it's malfunctioning), so there is no wait to continue moving.

That wastes energy but makes it time efficient for users (in terms of latency). OTOH, escalators are slow compared to most lifts/elevators, which means total trip time efficiency isn't good unless you are only going a floor or two or are competing with an elevator that stops a lot, where the latency gain may still beat the loss of vertical speed. Which is why escalators tend to get used where you've got lots of traffic volume but they aren't going up/down lots of floors.

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#374

Post by squeaky-clean »

Decade wrote: post #326
torpfactory wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trains don’t work in suburbs not because of space limitations - there just aren’t enough paying customers per mile of track to make the economics work.

There are not enough taxpaying residents to make roads work, either. https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2019/4/30/my-city-has-ma...

You NEED roads though. Even if you can reach 100% of the city through walking and public transportation, what do you do when you move? Take a train trip for your sofa, and another for your dining room table, and so on? How do local stores and restaurants get their goods delivered? How do you get packages larger than an envelope delivered to your home? How do emergency services and fire rescue reach your home?

Do towns exist with public transportation but no roads?

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#375

Post by jeffwilcox »

bsder wrote: post #255
neogodless wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think your example/link illustrates the point. > These stations are expensive (up to $100,000) and require more power than your house, so you’ll never have one of these in your garage. In other words, most chargers are not going to be "the best." Especially ones in less affluent neighborhoods, within a short drive (or on the way) of wherever you happen to be. Maybe it's a 10 minute round trip for a 5 minute wait (a…

> > These stations are expensive (up to $100,000) and require more power than your house, so you’ll never have one of these in your garage. I challenge this on the cost front and on the power front. There is zero reason why a fast charger should be $100,000 other than the fact that the volume is sufficiently low that these are all hand built. The semiconductors in that thing can't possibly be $100,000 in volume. Copp…

Permits, load studies, switchgear components for 3-phase systems (breakers etc.) cost more, engineering costs drive this up, etc. The grid and city permitting processes weren't designed for broad "consumer" scenarios, at least basing it off of the current Seattle experience, where even Level 2 charging can be difficult.

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#376

Post by xenocyon »

thehappypm wrote: post #364
xenocyon wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Per your circumstances (living in Boston, already possess a car, drive occasionally), a new Tesla purchase might be non-ideal even besides the charging issue, from a climate standpoint. There is a breakeven point where your cumulative carbon savings from using Boston electricity (i.e. mostly natural gas) versus gasoline intersect the one-time carbon emissions from manufacturing a new automobile. For folks who already…

I was getting a new car either way, replacing one that had broken.

Ah, that definitely changes the calculation completely.

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#377

Post by chiph »

There was a Model 3 owner at the last apartment I lived in. The buildings had garages for some apartments, and he had one. But the management wouldn't let him hire an electrician to wire up a 240V charger. So he left the interior garage door open and ran a cable to the clothes dryer outlet instead.

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#378

Post by esotericn »

squeaky-clean wrote: post #374
Decade wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are not enough taxpaying residents to make roads work, either. https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2019/4/30/my-city-has-ma...

You NEED roads though. Even if you can reach 100% of the city through walking and public transportation, what do you do when you move? Take a train trip for your sofa, and another for your dining room table, and so on? How do local stores and restaurants get their goods delivered? How do you get packages larger than an envelope delivered to your home? How do emergency services and fire rescue reach your home? Do town…

Heh, yeah. The 'apartment living on a bike' hypothesis is really at odds with itself in this sense, I feel.

If you own and live in a place long term then you can slowly bring materials to it, build up furniture, etc, it all works and makes sense.

But really this all seems to be based on hyper-specialism. The moving company is the only one allowed to use the roads. You've no space for tools or materials, so no DIY, get the joiners in. And so on and so forth.

Personally I find that really depressing. You may as well just plug yourself into the wall and turn on VR.

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#379

Post by esotericn »

freeflight wrote: post #357
neogodless wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Laundry. That just might be the perfect example. What a huge division of experience between the wealthy and the less wealthy. Most homeowners have laundry in their home. Starting and switching loads is a few minutes, and the rest of their time is still free. Many high-end apartments have laundry within a short walk from each residence. It's largely the same experience. But then those with less ability to afford "nice…

> Laundry. That just might be the perfect example. What a huge division of experience between the wealthy and the less wealthy. While a bit off-topic: I never understood why a lack of washing machines in flats is such a huge issue in some countries. In Germany, most flats come with a connector for your own washing machine, those that don't have on inside the flat often have them in the basement, where every party liv…

Germany is usually used as an example of good tenants' rights, though. I've never lived there but my understanding is that there's nothing wrong with renting, well off people might do it too, and so it's comfortable.

Apartment living mixed with bad tenants rights is a recipe for disaster because the majority of people then end up basically living in a minimum standard hellhole that no-one cares about. See: UK private rental sector.

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#380

Post by lukifer »

whatshisface wrote: post #134
wffurr wrote: post #127

Yet another reason the real answer to the climate crisis isn't EVs - it's public transit, bicycles, e-bikes, scooters, e-scooters, walking, etc. All these other modes are much lower impact on the environment than purchasing and operating an EV, much less an ICE.

You have to add "redesigned cities" to that list. Electric vehicles are almost as much a patch for ICE cities as they are a replacement for internal combustion.

Much is made of the "self-driving" part of autonomous vehicles, but I think "self-parking" could end up being just as significant. Imagine if there was no longer any reason to mandate parking capacity for planning and zoning purposes; you drive to your destination, and your car goes and parks itself (paying/negotiating automatically if needed), and returns when summoned via phone.
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