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The nearest charging stations to me are constantly filled by Car2Go. In San Diego they are all electric Smart cars and I use them sometimes, but monopolizing the charging infrastructure is not cool. For over 24 hours they occupied all the available spaces. Two were not even plugged in. The other two had long since finished charging.

At this location right next to the bay, the adjacent (non-handicapped) spot is rarely available. But, I got lucky when I took the photo early early in the morning. That is the only way that I finally got a charge.

This has happened several times now. They should have their own charging infrastructure if they intend to stay parked at them all the time. Public infrastructure is for the public not just one company.

I was Car2Go'Iced

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reeler said:
The nearest charging stations to me are constantly filled by Car2Go. In San Diego they are all electric Smart cars and I use them sometimes, but monopolizing the charging infrastructure is not cool. For over 24 hours they occupied all the available spaces. Two were not even plugged in. The other two had long since finished charging.

At this location right next to the bay, the adjacent (non-handicapped) spot is rarely available. But, I got lucky when I took the photo early early in the morning. That is the only way that I finally got a charge.

This has happened several times now. They should have their own charging infrastructure if they intend to stay parked at them all the time. Public infrastructure is for the public not just one company.

I was Car2Go'Iced

16128485497_b16d703c47_c.jpg

15691925424_86ff6dba8d_c.jpg


That stinks.
 

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Get a car2go membership and use it to move cars if needed. Then call them up and tell them why you moved it and they swill refund your session.
 
drees said:
Get a car2go membership and use it to move cars if needed. Then call them up and tell them why you moved it and they swill refund your session.

That's a clever idea, but are there annual membership fees in addition to the per use ones?
 
drees said:
Get a car2go membership and use it to move cars if needed. Then call them up and tell them why you moved it and they swill refund your session.
Plus a Car2go membership has additional benefits even for just occasional use, like when you need to run some errands downtown, or when you travel to another city for meetings and don't really need a rental car parked at the hotel for your entire stay.

But... The problem is that most of these Car2go clusters are in very busy parking lots. First you park your car in a distant space, walk over to the unplugged Car2go, move it to another distant space, walk to your car, drive back to the charging station, and by then the space may well be gone. Or double park your car next to the space while moving the Car2go and hope that's enough to warn off other cars and hope you won't get hit or ticketed.

The worst thing is Car2go's ambiguous terms of service. You are prohibited from parking in "non-sanctioned off street parking" like supermarket parking lots. You can park there temporarily while continuing to pay rental but cannot end a session there. But what is a sanctioned lot, what is a non-sanctioned lot, and how can you tell the difference? I've asked Car2go this question many times and have never received an answer. So how about the non-charging space you found to move the non-charging Car2go into? If you got lucky and found one right next to the charging stations you're almost certainly good. What if it's three rows over at the end of the lane? Probably good. What if it's in an adjacent connected parking lot, say like at Balboa Park? Is that still part of the same sanctioned location? What if it's in a nearby parking lot not connected by an internal driveway but accessible only by the public street? Is 0.1 miles away still "sanctioned"? Is 1.0 miles? 1.1 miles? There's no way to know. So if you move a fully charged Car2go out of a charging space you could end up liable for many hours of rental.

PS, not being able to tell where I can park and where I cannot is also the main thing that keeps me from using Car2go's otherwise great service.
 
I have had a membership since they first came to San Diego but have never used their service. However, I did drive one on the day they had an "Open House" event. For me the sign-up was free, and I have never been billed for membership.
Berlino said:
drees said:
Get a car2go membership and use it to move cars if needed. Then call them up and tell them why you moved it and they swill refund your session.

That's a clever idea, but are there annual membership fees in addition to the per use ones?
 
ElectricEddy said:
Surprised that the internal ground fault protection didn't trip. When I have run into this before in the rain with Add Energy units, the result is usually no power.

There are tons of AddEnergy stations in Quebec, but they're usually 1$/hr, so people are sure to re-holster at the end of sessions.
 
DaveinOlyWA said:
Another issue that is common is the cord being strewn about in a way that might allow someone to drive over it. guessing that only needs to happen a few times before we have another non functional site. :cry:

Unfortunately, I see that a lot as well. Loose cords are even more of a problem here because they get hidden under snow.
 
reeler said:
The nearest charging stations to me are constantly filled by Car2Go. In San Diego they are all electric Smart cars and I use them sometimes, but monopolizing the charging infrastructure is not cool. For over 24 hours they occupied all the available spaces. Two were not even plugged in. The other two had long since finished charging.
So, are they in violation of the CA law and subject to fine/towing? Hmmm, in any case, since these cars are so small, if I really needed the charge I'd just park behind one, pull the cord over and start charging. Of course, I'd stay near or in the car.
 
Reddy said:
So, are they in violation of the CA law and subject to fine/towing? Hmmm, in any case, since these cars are so small, if I really needed the charge I'd just park behind one, pull the cord over and start charging. Of course, I'd stay near or in the car.
They would be if any of those spaces had the requisite signage, which I've yet to see on ANY EV charging location. Worse, Car2Go was part of the original planning of the Blink installs and are "official" as far as Blink is concerned. There were complaints early on, and the result was the previously mentioned arrangement to be able to move cars and not get charged for doing their job for them.
 
Ahhh whats a little snow, you can still get close enough to plug in and wipe off the EVSE to start it :)

I have had our plugged in blizzard conditions outside at a chargpoint location and it worked fine. I also was plugged in during a rather large thunderstorm, that made me wonder if I shouldn't unplug the car....
 
DNAinaGoodWay said:
A lot of this around here lately.
I do not get this... why would anyone pile up sand around the public EVSE's? At least the sand is pretty and white. Our beach sand here in San Diego has lots of decomposing kelp in it so not so clean.
 
Most of it fell at temps near zero, making it very light, so it behaves very much like sand, forming drifts and dunes. Even when it's not snowing, the wind blows it into trenched pathways and driveways, re-filling them. We're used to snow, and are equiped for it, but with so much, so fast, and no melt off, we run out of places to put it.
 
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