Supercharger - Kayenta, AZ

[kevanmann]

So, California gets 200 Supercharger Stations and Tesla can't be bothered with making US 160 usable?

I know it sucks to see so many chargers being put in California especially when they’re close to one another, but my two cents as to why they’re doing that is because California is:
A.) where the highest amount of Tesla’s are in the country and
B.) where wait times at Superchargers are currently highest

My hope is that once they have built out enough capacity in the dense areas like CA, more attention will be turned to the rest of the highways and cities in the US in the year 2022 and beyond. They just have to solve their demand problem in CA first where the need is greatest and most pressing.

 

[tmoz]

Disappointed at this news. Kayenta is, by far, the most needed Supercharger site left in the entire Southwest. I really hate having to go via Gallup NM to get to AZ but no way I can make it to Flagstaff in my S-60, via US 160, without a long charge at level 2.

So, California gets 200 Supercharger Stations and Tesla can't be bothered with making US 160 usable?

Like others have said, if you have ever been to a crowded Ca supercharger, it is not a happy experience.
I'm not ready to upgrade the S85D yet, but the S60 is longer in the tooth than the 85. Time to treat yourself? Life is short - have fun? Just trying to offer silver linings. It does suck that Kayenta has fallen off the map, but COVID-19 has screwed up a lot of things. There is always Tuba City with a free L2 charger. You could get a bottle of wine, drink it, get sober, get fully charged, and be on your way again. Not the best of solutions, but a solution.

 

[dgpcolorado]

Like others have said, if you have ever been to a crowded Ca supercharger, it is not a happy experience.
I'm not ready to upgrade the S85D yet, but the S60 is longer in the tooth than the 85. Time to treat yourself? Life is short - have fun? Just trying to offer silver linings. It does suck that Kayenta has fallen off the map, but COVID-19 has screwed up a lot of things. There is always Tuba City with a free L2 charger. You could get a bottle of wine, drink it, get sober, get fully charged, and be on your way again. Not the best of solutions, but a solution.

I have waited in line at California Supercharger Stations a number of times. I've also charged at Kettleman City when there were three other cars there. However, I've also waited several hours to charge at Gallup NM (causing me to hit a major snow storm I would have avoided) and at Albuquerque NM and at Lone Tree CO.

How many Supercharger Stations are enough for California? Even if they were as ubiquitous as gas stations there might still be lines because it takes longer to charge than fill a gas tank. How long will it take until there are enough? Five more years? Ten? By then there will be a lot more cars wanting to use them.

Meanwhile Tesla is building yet another unnecessary fill-in station on I-25 in Monument CO. But not in useful locations such as Alamosa, Cortez or Kayenta. Go figure.

As for the suggestion to upgrade my S-60, I bought that car, used, because it was all I could afford; contrary to popular belief, not everyone at TMC is rich. I have Supercharged my lowly S-60 459 times, all but one on my many tens of thousands of miles road trips. I make do.

 

[Tectonic]

There is always Tuba City with a free L2 charger. You could get a bottle of wine, drink it, get sober, get fully charged, and be on your way again. Not the best of solutions, but a solution.

Jokes aside, even given lots of time, this isn't fully a solution for travel on US-160. Cortez to Tuba City is still 189 miles - this is doable in many circumstances (depending on your vehicle), but the problem is, if you get unlucky and run into a stiff headwind, there's really no contingency, because Kayenta doesn't even have an L2 option (at least not that I or Plugshare are aware of - I would love to hear about one). And if you're traveling across US-160, Monument Valley L2 charging isn't a good contingency either.

There's got to be a 240v outlet somewhere in Kayenta, right?

 

[SnowFlyer]

I have a bit of business that I regularly do on the Navajo and Hopi Rez's. Even in my old 2013 Model S, I had no issues traveling the area. In my wife's Model 3 it is even easier. A Supercharger in Kayenta would be great but it can be worked around.

In Tuba City you have some choices as well as Monument Valley area. Bluff has a 1772. Check your plugshare app for choices. In any event, the Navajo and Hopi lands are under covid siege. My contacts there do not want tourists. They are in crisis.

Some of us are not "tourists" and need to go through the 4 corners region to run businesses and to provide healthcare. Others would like to drive between Flagstaff and SW Colorado in a relatively straight line, instead of adding 54 miles each way . We currently have to take a very indirect route via Gallup NM because there's no way to drive Flagstaff to Cortez without going to a L2 in Tuba City for 2 hours to go via much of the region.

I bought my S in 2017 based on Tesla's commitment for a Kayenta SC in 2016. It's now 2021 and we have been patient for 4 years. I have many Flagstaff friends who are Tesla owners also depending on this one. We are all very disappointed that they have removed Kayenta from the map completely. The loss of planned transportation infrastructure is not good for the Navajo people either. The pandemic will end soon and they can use as much tourism as possible. They just lost 500+ good paying jobs with the decommissioning of the largest coal fired power plant in the western US. Power plant stacks that loomed over Page come down

Elon is now the richest man in the world and Tesla is a very wealthy company. They could easily spend more resources on SC's and fulfill their commitments to us, but in the name of maximizing profitability they are stiffing us. Similar to their choices of not sufficiently expanding their service network and long wait times. It should not be an "either or" choice between California OR rural highways. Telsla needs to accelerate the expansion of their SC network and fulfill their commitments. Please don't hose us.

 

[kevanmann]

They could easily spend more resources on SC's and fulfill their commitments to us, but in the name of maximizing profitability they are stiffing us. Similar to their choices of not sufficiently expanding their service network and long wait times. It should not be an "either or" choice between California OR rural highways. Telsla needs to accelerate the expansion of their SC network and fulfill their commitments. Please don't hose us.

While I agree that we need to accelerate SC expansion outside of California, I wouldn’t agree they’re stifling by maximizing profitability. I think they’re growing it as fast as they can despite it not being in all the places we’d like. I mean just look how many SCs are on the map for the next 2 years.

Also keep in mind that this most recent map update isn’t final or anything. Tesla says on the site they update it with new locations and timelines quarterly. Let’s check back in April.

 

[SnowFlyer]

While I agree that we need to accelerate SC expansion outside of California, I wouldn’t agree they’re stifling by maximizing profitability. I think they’re growing it as fast as they can despite it not being in all the places we’d like. I mean just look how many SCs are on the map for the next 2 years.

Also keep in mind that this most recent map update isn’t final or anything. Tesla says on the site they update it with new locations and timelines quarterly. Let’s check back in April.

Do you ever read Elon's tweets? Elon is obsessed with profitability. What else is constraining them?

Tesla is hugely valuable and now worth more than the next EIGHT largest auto companies combined.

Toyota + VW + BYD + NIO + Daimler + GM + BMW + Ferrari = $738 Billion

Tesla (just Tesla) = $774 Billion.

Their constrains to this are voluntary. I have no doubt they could build out the SC network much faster if they wanted to, probably this entire map in the next 12 months by selling a minute fraction of their stock.

Many of us have been very patient on Kayenta and it's well past time for Tesla to fulfill their end of the commitment. I intend bring this up to every Tesla employee I speak to and I hope many of you do the same. I hate to be that guy, but my patience has run out.... Squeaky wheel gets the grease.

 

[ArizonaP85]

I’d add that even a comparatively cheap 4 stall ver. 2 Supercharger would be a game changer. I’ve suggested before repurposing equipment removed from other locations upgraded from ver. 2 to ver. 3.

 

[MorrisonHiker]

Also keep in mind that this most recent map update isn’t final or anything. Tesla says on the site they update it with new locations and timelines quarterly. Let’s check back in April.

Colorado added nearly half a dozen unannounced Superchargers in 2020 that were never on the map. It's odd how some locations are listed years in advance and other locations don't show up until they are already operational.

I’d add that even a comparatively cheap 4 stall ver. 2 Supercharger would be a game changer. I’ve suggested before repurposing equipment removed from other locations upgraded from ver. 2 to ver. 3.

Tesla set up a lot of temporary Superchargers on pallets in Nevada and Utah last year. Some were at totally new locations while others were at existing Supercharger sites. Hopefully Kayenta will be worthy of at least a couple urban Superchargers one of these days.

 

[sdoorex]

Do you ever read Elon's tweets? Elon is obsessed with profitability. What else is constraining them?

Tesla is hugely valuable and now worth more than the next EIGHT largest auto companies combined.

Toyota + VW + BYD + NIO + Daimler + GM + BMW + Ferrari = $738 Billion

Tesla (just Tesla) = $774 Billion.

Their constrains to this are voluntary. I have no doubt they could build out the SC network much faster if they wanted to, probably this entire map in the next 12 months by selling a minute fraction of their stock.

Many of us have been very patient on Kayenta and it's well past time for Tesla to fulfill their end of the commitment. I intend bring this up to every Tesla employee I speak to and I hope many of you do the same. I hate to be that guy, but my patience has run out.... Squeaky wheel gets the grease.

With their valuation, and how easy it was to raise $10B last year, I'm a little surprised they haven't done a raise dedicated to superchargers. Even if each site cost $1M each, which I think is high for most sites where they don't own the land, they could double the current worldwide network with a bit over $2B.

 

[tmoz]

It could be that this generation of chargers is going to become obsolete in the next 2 yrs and they don't want to build out too many of them with this generation. What if they had build 1000 SCs with the old 120 kW max? Having said that, it would be interesting to know their budgeting logic. Another factor is staffing. Have they hired enough people to do the location searching and form filling? Do they have open job requisitions that are unfilled? Do they calculate how many Tesla vehicle would potentially use the site? Or some other formula to estimate the effect on sales? How locations pop up out of thin air are stories I'd like to hear in detail.

 

[Trnsl8r]

It could be that this generation of chargers is going to become obsolete in the next 2 yrs and they don't want to build out too many of them with this generation. What if they had build 1000 SCs with the old 120 kW max? ....

Even if that was the case, there would at least then be sites. Many of the original sites from 2013 have since been expanded and/or upgraded. And 120kW in Kayenta would have been better than 0kW.

 

[Tectonic]

It could be that this generation of chargers is going to become obsolete in the next 2 yrs and they don't want to build out too many of them with this generation. What if they had build 1000 SCs with the old 120 kW max? Having said that, it would be interesting to know their budgeting logic. Another factor is staffing. Have they hired enough people to do the location searching and form filling? Do they have open job requisitions that are unfilled? Do they calculate how many Tesla vehicle would potentially use the site? Or some other formula to estimate the effect on sales? How locations pop up out of thin air are stories I'd like to hear in detail.

What better place to have an outdated supercharger than Kayenta?

Let's hope they are ramping up supercharger deployment. Like you're saying it takes time given that they need to ramp up all aspects of deployment (hardware and staff) - and planning/permitting can be multi-year processes. I think they said they will start to produce V3 supercharger hardware at Shanghai soon, so maybe that will help alleviate the hardware bottleneck.

As far as the locations that pop up out of thin air, I think these are mostly targets of opportunity for Tesla. Many are part of multi-site agreements with hosts (e.g. Target stores or Kum & Go gas stations), which greatly streamlines the planning process for Tesla. Others may be enthusiastic host sites willing to provide incentives ($$$) to Tesla. Kayenta has very few potential host sites, but maybe they can still work something out after the covid storm is over.

 

[gene]

From what I have heard from Tesla Supercharger staff, the installation headaches of Superchargers is not about money but the usual red tape and hoops of the local government and then second, the available infrastructure. There have been a few cases where communities did not have enough spare electricity to share.

From what I have learned in my conversations with the director of Tesla Mexico, even some of the larger towns in mid Baja, simply can not supply the current. Tesla has done on excellent job with their choice of locations for destination chargers all the way down the Baja peninsula. They have been getting a fair amount if use as I have seen.

 

[kevanmann]

From what I have heard from Tesla Supercharger staff, the installation headaches of Superchargers is not about money but the usual red tape and hoops of the local government and then second, the available infrastructure. There have been a few cases where communities did not have enough spare electricity to share.

Yep, I forgot to say this. Money is only one factor in the equation of how a Supercharger gets built. You also need to consider the legal approvals/permits and any local utility challenges you might have.

I suspect the issue in Kayenta was a problem of local approval and utility capacity.

 

[Tectonic]

From what I have learned in my conversations with the director of Tesla Mexico, even some of the larger towns in mid Baja, simply can not supply the current. Tesla has done on excellent job with their choice of locations for destination chargers all the way down the Baja peninsula. They have been getting a fair amount if use as I have seen.

I don't know if there are power supply issues like Baja in Kayenta (I haven't heard this claim, but it's possible), but even if so, Tesla has not done a similarly excellent job of putting in destination chargers in Kayenta.

 

[smartypnz]

Know anyone in Kayenta that could streamline the process?? Anyone who could provide a usable location? Power availability?
Tesla cannot decide where by just putting a pin on a map. Not knowing why this was removed, I suspect there are reasons other than Tesla losing interest.

 

[IsthataTesl.a?]

I know Kayenta isn't exactly near Indian Wells, but as someone who's driven twenty-five or thirty miles an hour to make it to Holbrook , Arizona from Blanding, Utah, Indian Wells, Arizona might also be a good spot. There is actually ONE established business there. I've wanted to stop in there and talk to employees about a contact there.

If anyone's ever driven half the speed limit, even in an 85, on an unpatrolled road, at night, "on the Rez" with no cell phone service and nearly no other souls around, it's AN ADVENTURE, it's not necessarily a great use of time, nor FUN.

 

[tmoz]

Or if the hotel in Tuba City upgraded from an L2 to an SC, that would help, but I don't think that would increase their business. I'm not sure the L2 does either.

 

[IsthataTesl.a?]

Or if the hotel in Tuba City upgraded from an L2 to an SC, that would help, but I don't think that would increase their business. I'm not sure the L2 does either.

I think a Tesla Supercharger is more likely to increase business as long as they have a restaurant or gift/snack shop. Case in point, think of all the L2s you haven't visited, and probably have no desire to visit even. Plus some hotels apparently have locals using the Tesla Destination Charger as if it were their own, walking to it or getting dropped off at it. That's pretty lame if it happens continuously.