Cal State Fullerton Station Event - Friday, Jan 13th 11AM

[richard]

From Ryan Grady at Charge Harbor, and Linda Nicholes, who is hosting plug-in drivers who are interested in attending:

CSU Fullerton will be holding a Press Event at the Rooftop level of their Eastside Parking Garage. They have installed a huge multi-megawatt solar array and also six charging stations. At the event, they will be “flipping the switch” on the solar panels and the charging stations.

REC Solar is organizing the event, and for sure there will be university VIPs and local elected officials, and they are hoping local media. This is a beautiful installation and will make for some really stunning photos.

What is needed are some plug in vehicles…..on the day of the event there will be no students on campus so the rooftop level will be empty except for the plug in vehicles and the people attending the event.

..the idea is to provide at least one representative of the vehicles currently on the road…one Leaf, one Tesla, one Volt…and any others we can find. I am going to call my friends at Fisker to see if we can get a Karma.

Directions

Address is the Eastside Parking Structure on the campus of CSU Fullerton. This structure is off of Nutwood Ave on Folino Dr. If you go to the Coulomb ChargePoint map and zoom in on Fullerton and then CSU Fullerton you can click on a station and get turn by turn directions to the stations – there are 4 stations on the map now, all 6 [should be] up by event day. Stations are on the rooftop.

RSVP

RSVP deadline was yesterday, whoops. Maybe they're still taking reservations. Link is here.

Some additional details about the site

• 5-6 Level 2 Coulomb stations

• Available for use on a first-come first-served basis

 

[mwalsh]

I'm going to be there. Linda asked if I could attend a week or so ago.

 

[richard]

I'm going to be there. Linda asked if I could attend a week or so ago.

Glad you'll be there, Michael. Linda's email got buried in my inbox. But I can't usually attend these weekday things anyway, as much as I'd like to.

Take lots of photos and post here. This seems like potentially a great site for many in the forum.

 

[Boomer23]

I just RSVPd online. Happy to be in the background crowd of EVs.

 

[ockam]

What a great way to promote EVs. I hope to see more solar powered charging stations in the near future!

 

[Boomer23]

I attended this event this morning, along with mwalsh, JPVLeaf, tbleakne, keijidosha and Linda Nicholes and others from Plug In America.

It was a nice event, commemorating the opening of the new, approximately 300 kW solar canopies and six ChargePoint charging stations atop the Eastside Parking structure on campus, near Nutwood and the 57 freeway. Lots of dignitaries from the University, the State legislature and companies who worked on the project, most notably REC Solar and AECOM. This project brings the solar PV capacity at CSUF to 1 MW.

I counted 20 EVs, including 8 LEAFs, 4 Volts, 2 Teslas, 2 RAV4s, a Mini E, a Corbin 3 wheeler, and two converted ICE cars, a Honda Civic and a VW pickup truck.

According to a campus representative, parking permits will be required during permit hours, but outside of permit hours, parking is free. Posted signs stated permit hours as 7 am to 10 pm M-Th and 7 am to 5 pm Fridays. The Chargepoints will be live and active at all times. Currently there is no charge for using the ChargePoints, but that will probably change within a few months.

I'll post pictures when I get a chance.

 

[Aeolus]

Sorry i missed reading about this. I would have been able to make this without too much change in my schedule.

 

[tbleakne]

After the official speeches we had a very informative chat with Doug Kind, Manager, Commissioning & Energy, Fullerton Physical Plant. He promised that when the fees for using the Chargpoint EVSEs begin, the fee will only apply to the time your car is actually charging, NOT the total time the car is plugged-in. He said that originally Chargepoint was not setup to bill this way, but it is now, possibly with his urging. We should welcome this change in billing, and lobby other Chargepoint sites to adopt it as well.

This location offers the following advantages for in-route charging, especially off-hours:
6 Chargepoints.
< .2 miles off of I-57
Open 24/7 with campus security.
nice view from roof

Several eating establishments within 250 yards:
The Habit Burger Grill
Tully's Coffee
Which Wich Superior Sandwiches

Disadvantages
not free
parking structure will be full during in-session school hours, but hopefully folks will obey EV signage. As the pictures below show, the location is on the roof, which should be the last to fill up. The solar array looks nice.

 

[occ]

So are you allowed to get a parking permit for the lot if you're not a student or staff or in someway associated with Cal State Fullerton?...in case you need to charge during permit hours?

 

[Randy]

Disadvantages
not free

I appreciate the info and photos; just don't understand the thought about "not free" being called a disadvantage.

There are some real costs to putting in a facility like that, as there are with other charging stations. I think "free juice" will be more of an exception than the rule.

Paying a fair price to be able to charge at public locations is fine; in my mind it's actually an "advantage" to be able to get a charge at public sites like these...

Randy

 

[KeiJidosha]

So are you allowed to get a parking permit for the lot if you're not a student or staff or in someway associated with Cal State Fullerton?...in case you need to charge during permit hours?

Yes. You can purchase a "Daily Permit" pass good for the day at the Kiosk next to the elevators. It is currently $8. Kiosk takes cash only, not credit cards.

 

[JPVLeaf]

Decided to swing by CSU Fullerton to allow my car to 'learn' the EVSEs at the eastide parking structure and the one by the transportation office/phys plant.

The one by the phys. plant was occupied by a Leaf, done charging. There is 4-hr limit, EV signage. However, no way to know how long the Leaf had been there, or when the station would be available. Also, no easily visible contact info on the vehicle to inquire. It was about 2p.

At the eastside parking structure, of the 10 parking spaces within reasonable distance from the Chargepoint EVSEs, 2 were occupied by Leafs, both with faculty/staff parking permiits, and both done charging. These spots require campus parking permits, but do not have signage with parking or charging time limits. Also, no marking on the spaces (ground) reinforcing these spots to be for EV only. However, unexpectedly (to me), the scroll on the Chargepoints state several times that hybrids/Priuses are not 'allowed'. Now, of the remaining spots, 6 were ICE'd. Depending on parking enforcement, I'd imagine this will be a typical occurence. There were 2 spots available. I took one of the two spots, and Chargepoint-charging was successful. As stated earlier in thise thread, charging is free but campus parking permits are required.

Very pleased to see CSU Fullerton stepping up to the plate to make these available. With consistent EV parking enforcement, these will be a valuable and AVAILABLE asset to campus commuters, and travelling EVers. Otherwise, they'll just be expensive, and underutilized, EVSE spots occupied by the unintended ICEers.

EDIT: Locating these EVSEs on the top level of the parking structure was likely the best move short of also placing them on the far end of the level. I'd imagine most times of the day, these would be among the last to fill. When I arrived, there were nearly no regular spots left, and commuters were doing the hoover-method. But by the time I left, several spots around were open, but only one if the EVspot ICErs had left ....

 

[mwalsh]

I acted as something of an intermediary to put the CSUF Manager of Commissioning and Energy, Doug Kind, in touch with the folks at Nissan. Doug wants to put a DC Quick Charger in, and obviously finds the anticipated pricing for the Nissan units very attractive. I don't know how much progress has been made, but the only sticking point on Doug's side was that the units needed to be UL listed, and I just recently found information indicating that had happened as of early December.

Doug thought he could arrange 30 minutes free parking at that particular spot AND was trying to make the installation happen near the campus Starbucks, which would be great brand exposure for Nissan.

 

[JPVLeaf]

That'd be awesome. L2 for faculty, staff and students on campus for a few hours. QC for others.

 

[JeremyW]

Was in the area Sunday, and stopped by the ones on top of the parking structure. On the way in, you pass by this sign:

When I got to the top, I found a Leaf suckling down at 3.764 kW.

They emphasize no prius parking. Not sure what they will say when the plug in prius shows up in March... I guess they don't have a problem with Volt's? :? :lol:

Solar Infrastructure:

Cool looking LED light. The parking structure is full of them.

I hope every parking structure around here ends up looking like this. We have a lot of sun in southern California. Don't let the clouds fool you.