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U.S. Postal Service starts nationwide electric vehicle fleet, buying 9,250 EVs

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Re: U.S. Postal Service starts nationwide electric vehicle fleet, buying 9,250 EVs

#461

Post by hot_gril »

psychlops wrote: post #343
hot_gril wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also for anything government-related, like voting. Pretty important to have.

Agreed. I'd counter that much (all?) of it should be online.

In a perfect country. Currently even the govt services that are online are terrible, and not everyone has internet access. I don't know the history behind mail, but I suspect it's become kind of a personal right in the US. If/when all these problems that rely on mail get solved, mail trucks will be the last to go, not the first like someone a few comments up was hoping.

Re: U.S. Postal Service starts nationwide electric vehicle fleet, buying 9,250 EVs

#462

Post by hot_gril »

trompetenaccoun wrote: post #208
hot_gril wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also for anything government-related, like voting. Pretty important to have.

Important for facilitating fraud. I can't speak for the US specifically as I've never lived there but in the countries I know almost all cases of court proven voter fraud were connected with the postal service. Through interception of the mail, the fraudulent ordering of mail in ballots, "lost" mail in ballots that never got counted or simply because in some places the mail in ballots are counted separately and there…

Voting is a political hot topic in the US. Voting by mail is either 100% safe or totally broken depending on who you ask. Unlike many countries, there's nothing acting as a required voter ID here, and that's always on the platform in important races. You can register to vote with just a name and say you have no home address or SSN, of course it's illegal to lie about those things. I think people only agree that electronic voting is untrustworthy.

I guess my point is, it's very hard to change how voting works here.

Re: U.S. Postal Service starts nationwide electric vehicle fleet, buying 9,250 EVs

#463

Post by sgt »

AdamN wrote: post #257
sgt wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And with a lot of cars having turbos, which introduce a noticeable lag (especially as the cars get older - it seems to be inevitable), now you have an additional lag with the auto-stop/start.

Turbo lag isn't increased by start/stop. Start/stop may delay the initial acceleration but from then on, any turbo lag would be the same regardless of the state of the engine before initial acceleration.

That's what I mean. I stay away from dieselturbos etc due to the lag. And now they add another lag on top of that. Bring on electric.

Re: U.S. Postal Service starts nationwide electric vehicle fleet, buying 9,250 EVs

#464

Post by sgt »

mnw21cam wrote: post #258
sgt wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't like that feature very much since it basically introduces a lag.

While I didn't like the start/stop feature when I had a hire car briefly, I can't see how it would ever add a lag. By the time you have pressed the clutch pedal down to put it in gear, it has started.

Nobody uses manuals anymore unless you are a driving an enthusiast car like Toyota GT86 etc

Re: U.S. Postal Service starts nationwide electric vehicle fleet, buying 9,250 EVs

#465

Post by [deleted] »

kennywinker wrote: post #424
nightski wrote: post #397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an avid cyclist it really bothers me when any cyclist, e-bike or not, violates the rules of the road. It's so important we follow them. Much of the hatred received is because of bikers doing things they are not supposed to giving us a bad reputation.

The road system and rules were built with cars in mind. They do not make sense for a cyclist, and following them is not the safest way to ride. I will follow rules that keep me safe, and allow my free movement. I won’t follow rules that make me less safe

[deleted]

Re: U.S. Postal Service starts nationwide electric vehicle fleet, buying 9,250 EVs

#466

Post by starkparker »

WalterBright wrote: post #454
xgb84j wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I heard of state tenders where they basically have some minimum requirements that have to be met and otherwise choose the cheapest option. For a large amount of vehicles it is probably cheapest to design one that meets all the minimum requirements exactly.

When Seattle started with light rail, they ordered custom cars that were "specially designed for the Pacific Northwest". Nobody was ever able to explain what was special about the PNW and light rail cars. But hey, it cost a lot of money!

There were two major differences from the stock Kinkisharyo cars, one technical, one political:

- Most North American light rail systems use 750V electrification, Sound Transit used 1500V to reduce the number of substations.[1]

- The cars arbitrarily had to be assembled at Boeing in Everett "because of a 'Buy American' requirement written into the Kinkisharyo International contract ... Federal grant money is being used to help pay for the light-rail fleet, which means a percentage of the rail cars must be built in the U.S. and that final assembly must take place in Sound Transit's service district".[2]

Seattle's cars also used 70% low-floor access for ADA accessibility and included more bike racks, which isn't unique now but were both relatively novel at the time.[3]

1: https://web.archive.org/web/20150924022530/http://www.global...

2: https://web.archive.org/web/20070524112643/http://www.herald...

3: http://www.kinkisharyo.com/main/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/S...

Re: U.S. Postal Service starts nationwide electric vehicle fleet, buying 9,250 EVs

#467

Post by [deleted] »

kennywinker wrote: post #424
nightski wrote: post #397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an avid cyclist it really bothers me when any cyclist, e-bike or not, violates the rules of the road. It's so important we follow them. Much of the hatred received is because of bikers doing things they are not supposed to giving us a bad reputation.

The road system and rules were built with cars in mind. They do not make sense for a cyclist, and following them is not the safest way to ride. I will follow rules that keep me safe, and allow my free movement. I won’t follow rules that make me less safe

[deleted]

Re: U.S. Postal Service starts nationwide electric vehicle fleet, buying 9,250 EVs

#468

Post by dbg31415 »

dbg31415 wrote: post #458
viraptor wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Weight and size correlate with fuel/energy usage. There's also availability of access/parking space and time to access the packages. If you don't deliver more than a bag each day, a car is not needed. If you don't deliver large things, a van is not needed. Etc. So if you already have a van, it didn't matter if it's half loaded or full. But if you're getting new vehicles, 1 bike doing 3 trips may be way cheaper over t…

Fair points. What I would love to see is a ban on advertising in the mail. It all just ends in the bin. Such a waste to see those poor postal people sorting trash flyers for each house. Has to be soul crushing for them. And all I do is skim it and chuck it and get annoyed I had to sift through to find real mail… Some sort of “opt in” code… that companies who sent bills and places I signed up to could use. But that wo…

Oof, I had no idea... the USPS is actually behind all those trash ad campaigns.

They even sell you mailing lists for your target audience. Cringe.

https://www.uspsdelivers.com/direct-mail-cost-calculator/

Re: U.S. Postal Service starts nationwide electric vehicle fleet, buying 9,250 EVs

#469

Post by crote »

dahfizz wrote: post #446
crote wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Alternatively, use cheap local storage to "build up" energy for a fast charge.

It takes $100 of batteries to store 15 cents of electricity. What kind of cheap storage are you envisioning?

You could look into cheaper batteries, as there is no need to use the latest and greatest technology. Supercapacitors might also be an option.

It's all an economic sum, really: when do the higher connection fees and increased demand pricing outweigh battery cost? We are already seeing grid-scale battery storage being used in practice, applying that to a more local use case might not be that unrealistic.

Besides, if the alternative is no charging station, you can probably charge significantly higher fees.

Re: U.S. Postal Service starts nationwide electric vehicle fleet, buying 9,250 EVs

#470

Post by ed25519FUUU »

mrj wrote: post #449
ed25519FUUU wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don’t realize it because they don’t get any of the benefits. Electricity costs are rising across the country almost without exception. Meanwhile California is paying other states to take electricity because they generate so much excess power during the duck curve (while simultaneously having rolling blackouts)

No rolling blackouts here. And prices have been falling. Most plans around here are paying $0.10496. I'm on a time schedule and do most of my charging at $0.07688. The price per kWh has been consistently falling. I think the GP is right, energy is changing. https://cleanpoweralliance.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/Cl...

That's my point. We're told (wholesale) prices are falling, but retail prices are rising everywhere[1]. Especially in CA where they're skyrocketing compared to the national average[2].

That's why they don't "realize it", because so far it has had ZERO positive impact on them.

1. https://www.statista.com/statistics/183700/us-average-retail...

2. https://www.pleasantonweekly.com/blogs/p/2022/03/06/when-wil...

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