El joe
Active Member
1,000% agree. When I first got my Bolt and began asking about these issues, Bolt owners condescendingly noted that I was a newbie and I had to lift the cord, etc. and that I'd get used to it. But 99% of people that get an EV aren't going to know the tactics to try to get a charger to work, nor will they care. They just want reliability and when chargers don't work and they get stranded somewhere, it's going to be really bad and stand out as being a huge problem.I think the next few years will be telling for non-Tesla EVs. Now that Ford and VW have their first “mass market” EVs out, these charging network issues will start to stand out more.
Non-technical and non-enthusiast drivers will not be very forgiving of being left stranded with their families by their EVs because of flaky charging. It’s one of those things that could quickly sour a lot of people on EVs and limit their adoption in the US if it isn’t addressed (even if the cars are otherwise great).
Ford and VW will probably end up needing to take ownership of the infrastructure and fix it if they want to succeed.