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Saturdays are good for me. Finding a centrally located spot with EVSEs may be challenging.

According to the Blink map, the 'Rio Solado College' has 6 Blink stations. I wonder if there's some place to eat or something near there?
 
Anyone have an update on the DCFC at Ecotality? Is it online? I'm headed to tempe and wouldn't mind trying it out.

The blink site says 5 chargers "off network".
 
leafkabob said:
It looks like the bill as proposed now has a $.01 per mile tax. Here is a link to the current version of the bill: http://www.azleg.gov/legtext/50leg/2r/bills/hb2257p.pdf

When I e-mailed the sponsor, Steve Farley, he wrote back and said:
"Thanks for writing. Our state gas tax is restricted to only be used for roads. That gas tax, a flat 18 cents that has not been increased since 1987, and as people use less gas, the fund is shrinking as construction costs go up. While all-electric cars are not a large number yet, they will be. Their increase will lay bare the unsustainability of our roadway finance system that is almost exclusively dependent on gas sales. If we place a fee in place now, the problem will be ameliorated, and eventually we can allow nybrids and other cars to transition from gas tax to a tax per mile traveled, so that our road maintenance and construction funds remain suistainable. This will take time, and we hope to spur the federal government to act as well. In the meantime, most EV owners who have contacted me agree that paying an average of $120 a year to maintain the roads they use is not unreasonable."
Click to expand...

FWIW I am told that the "$.01 per mile tax on EV's" bill is dead. It was assigned to two different committees, and neither one heard the bill in committee before the deadline for hearing bills in committee expired a couple of weeks ago.
 
leafkabob said:
leafkabob said:
It looks like the bill as proposed now has a $.01 per mile tax. Here is a link to the current version of the bill: http://www.azleg.gov/legtext/50leg/2r/bills/hb2257p.pdf

When I e-mailed the sponsor, Steve Farley, he wrote back and said:
"Thanks for writing. Our state gas tax is restricted to only be used for roads. That gas tax, a flat 18 cents that has not been increased since 1987, and as people use less gas, the fund is shrinking as construction costs go up. While all-electric cars are not a large number yet, they will be. Their increase will lay bare the unsustainability of our roadway finance system that is almost exclusively dependent on gas sales. If we place a fee in place now, the problem will be ameliorated, and eventually we can allow nybrids and other cars to transition from gas tax to a tax per mile traveled, so that our road maintenance and construction funds remain suistainable. This will take time, and we hope to spur the federal government to act as well. In the meantime, most EV owners who have contacted me agree that paying an average of $120 a year to maintain the roads they use is not unreasonable."
Click to expand...

FWIW I am told that the "$.01 per mile tax on EV's" bill is dead. It was assigned to two different committees, and neither one heard the bill in committee before the deadline for hearing bills in committee expired a couple of weeks ago.
Click to expand...
Hurray! Government inefficiency actually working for us! (although I doubt this was an accident - probably was deliberately pigeon-holed to do the right thing without rousing the rabble).
 
TickTock said:
leafkabob said:
leafkabob said:
It looks like the bill as proposed now has a $.01 per mile tax. Here is a link to the current version of the bill: http://www.azleg.gov/legtext/50leg/2r/bills/hb2257p.pdf

When I e-mailed the sponsor, Steve Farley, he wrote back and said:
"Thanks for writing. Our state gas tax is restricted to only be used for roads. That gas tax, a flat 18 cents that has not been increased since 1987, and as people use less gas, the fund is shrinking as construction costs go up. While all-electric cars are not a large number yet, they will be. Their increase will lay bare the unsustainability of our roadway finance system that is almost exclusively dependent on gas sales. If we place a fee in place now, the problem will be ameliorated, and eventually we can allow nybrids and other cars to transition from gas tax to a tax per mile traveled, so that our road maintenance and construction funds remain suistainable. This will take time, and we hope to spur the federal government to act as well. In the meantime, most EV owners who have contacted me agree that paying an average of $120 a year to maintain the roads they use is not unreasonable."
Click to expand...

FWIW I am told that the "$.01 per mile tax on EV's" bill is dead. It was assigned to two different committees, and neither one heard the bill in committee before the deadline for hearing bills in committee expired a couple of weeks ago.
Click to expand...
Hurray! Government inefficiency actually working for us! (although I doubt this was an accident - probably was deliberately pigeon-holed to do the right thing without rousing the rabble).
Click to expand...

As you probably know, the Arizona legislature is heavily Republican. They control everything, including who is assigned to committees, and the assignment of bills to committees. The Dems have been complaining this session that all of their bills have been assigned to two committees instead of just one, as the majority of Rep bills are assigned. They claim that the "two-committee" assignment is the kiss of death for their bills.

It is pretty rare for a Dem to get a bill though and I don't know if this one was intentionally buried because the Reps don't like additional taxes, or if it was simply not deemed to rise to the level of importance as other Rep bills, like the one to allow students to carry guns on campus or the one to allow school districts to teach a Bible class (but not a class on the Quoran, Book of Morman, etc.). ;)
 
turbo2ltr said:
Anyone have an update on the DCFC at Ecotality? Is it online? I'm headed to tempe and wouldn't mind trying it out.

The blink site says 5 chargers "off network".
Click to expand...

I used it last week, and it was working fine. Only available during normal business hours. I think they keep it 'offline' just in case they want to test a software update or something.

As a pointer, you can select other ending charge levels, besides the two listed on the screen. I recommend that you go for 90%, as that seems to really produce a 80% charge level.
 
Unfortunately, I barely use 3 bars heading downtown from north Phoenix so I didn't think it was good to try and fast charge a battery that wasn't really that low. Unfortunately the trip back sucks up a lot of juice and I was down to 3 bars/18 miles (old firmware) by the time I got back. Total trip was about 55 miles, 98% highway.

I was trying to avoid having to charge from zero at the office since I get the electric bill.. lol.
 
Just drove by Ikea at lunch and see that they have 4 new Blink stations, with EV Only parking. One of them looks like it could be used with a handicapped parking spot. They are operational, but don't appear on the Blink map yet. I plugged into one of them.

This is a good location, right at I-10 and Warner Rd. The only restaurant within short walking distance is Ikea's own food court, but there's a lot of other shops there.
 
phxsmiley said:
Just drove by Ikea at lunch and see that they have 4 new Blink stations, with EV Only parking. One of them looks like it could be used with a handicapped parking spot. They are operational.

This is a good location, right at I-10 and Warner Rd. The only restaurant within short walking distance is Ikea's own food court, but there's a lot of other shops there.
Click to expand...

Great news! Thanks for the report. I've been needing to go to ikea for a while, but the trip is really pushing the limits without charging. I just can't bring myself to stop somewhere to charge that isn't my destination. Ive done a slightly longer trip (to 10 and the 202 and back) on a single charge but that was with me driving way too slow for comfort.
 
phxsmiley said:
Just drove by Ikea at lunch and see that they have 4 new Blink stations, with EV Only parking. One of them looks like it could be used with a handicapped parking spot. They are operational, but don't appear on the Blink map yet. I plugged into one of them.

This is a good location, right at I-10 and Warner Rd. The only restaurant within short walking distance is Ikea's own food court, but there's a lot of other shops there.
Click to expand...
I went to Ikea to check out the charge stations there. I like the fact that they have them all on the west side of the parking lot near the freeway, instead of at a prime parking location near the entrance where people can get jealous and maybe key your car, or just ignore the EV parking sign and ICE those lots anyway.

One of the 4 stations is definitely designed for the handicapped spot because you can see they lower the station a bit to make it not height challenged for somebody in a wheelchair. And the direction of that station facing the handicapped spot is also indicative of its intention.
 
I also checked out the EVSE at the SRP building on Mill Av. If you're coming north-bound on Mill Ave, you'll not be able to turn left into the SRP parking lot, because it only has a right lane entrance for south bound traffic from Mill only. So if you're north bound from Mill, you'll need to pass it and find a legal U turn, unless you're brave enough to cut across anyway if there's no southbound traffic at the turn.

I also checked out the EVSE at the Desert Botanical garden nearby. I was disappointed to see that there's only 1 EVSE there. There was a silver Leaf already plugged in there. They also blocked the entrance into that parking aisle with red cones. So the silver Leaf was the only car in that whole parking aisle and it must have ignored the cones and driven right over them. You would think that for the size of that parking lot, they would put in at least 2 EVSE to start with.
 
What if we have a get together this Saturday March 10th, or Saturday April 7th at the Ikea store, around 9AM. I'm busy for the other weekends. There are 4 Blink units there that people can use from the North. We can go in and get some breakfast.

There are also 6 Blink units at Rio Solado college, to the North about 4 miles, but those are always occupied by Rio Solado campus vehicles - I have a complaint in with Blink about that...
 

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