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Finding working chargers in Edinburgh itself has been much more difficult. I have now tried three different 22kW ChargePlaceScotland points, that should have allowed me to leave the car either overnight (walking distance from our accommodation) or parked for a few hours whilst we be tourists.
Scotland was pretty bad, can vouch for that.
Bested only by the Lake District which was really bad.
The problem I find is when chargers are inaccessible or out of service. I noticed in York a set of BP Pulse points and York council stated that these are exempt from parking charges but BP do charge for chaging... result is that all 6 of them were occupied by EVs which had their cables plugged in but none charging. I was lucky and one left as I waited wondering what to do, and the chargers were functioning and I did get a charge so the others were truly just hogging the free parking.
BP Pulse is a bit shit though. At another point around the corner in Haringey it claimed empty spots, arrived and there were empty spots, attempt to charge and it claims it's out of action due to it being "ICE'd"... had to Google to see that this meant it thinks ICE vehicles were parked there, but nope... just 2 of us attempting to charge and a charger that insists it is out of action.
The vehicles are the future... the infrastructure and weird rules that vary from place to place are not.
Would love to see a nationwide (EU wide if possible) law that states that EV chargers must act a bit like petrol stations:
- Advertise prices prominently
- Allow all vehicles to use them (we'd have to supply cables to a universal socket on the charger)
- Charge hefty parking fees when not charging (even in areas without parking fees)
- Be accessible to all users, i.e. accept contact free payment options by card
So few chargers even start to tick those boxes.
- Advertise prices prominently
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Velocio
@mashton
Looking good. Hope it goes swimmingly.
On my own road trip (London York Edinburgh Pitlochry Colintraive Glasgoe Manchester London) I have so far found the open road bit (I'm as far as Edinburgh's now) really easy for charging and cruising.
Finding working chargers in Edinburgh itself has been much more difficult. I have now tried three different 22kW ChargePlaceScotland points, that should have allowed me to leave the car either overnight (walking distance from our accommodation) or parked for a few hours whilst we be tourists.
The former is in a car park that is locked overnight, even though ZapMap advertises the charger as 24/7.
The latter two are in building sites and are inaccessible.
In the end I drove to a semi suburban McDonalds that had 2 x InstaVolt 150kW chargers in the car park. Read a book for an hour or so to get a full charge. Totally fine, just a lot less convenient than hoped for.
Off to Pitlochry today. Fingers crossed.