Blame das idiots at VW. Same problem in Canada with the Electrify network. If governments seriously want EVs, they need to get their thumbs out and treat charge infrastructure like they treated handicapped parking.
Overnight, under threat of real fines, handicapped parking was everywhere, and maintained.
In Spain the government straight out said that they don’t care about the network, that private companies should solve it. And they did, in the most corporate way possible, absolutely enshittified, terrible for users, great for profit. I really believe some of the companies keep their chargers as broken as possible to promote ICE cars.
EU passed some common sense laws (mandatory card payment, open APIs with availability info) but so far they were just ignored. There’s also mandatory chargers every 50km on some highways but the law was passed years ago and the Spanish government is just now planning to build 3 charging stations as a trial. And that’s the leftist government we’re talking about. I can’t wait what will happen when the right wing party takes over in a year or two.
It EV are supposed to be a tool to make as dependent on shitty corpos like Google (you need Android phone to use chargers) I don’t want it. But there’s still chance EU’s regulation will take effect and it will be usable. We’ll see.
In Spain the government straight out said that they don’t care about the network, that private companies should solve it.
They can still legislate minimum number charging stations in parking lots and fine for lack of function. Just use find and replace on handicap parking laws.
Chargers at parking lots are very common and it’s not the problem. When you’re driving on a highway you don’t want to go to a parking in the center of the city to charger there. You will loose 30-60 minutes just to get in and out of the town. Chargers are needed at service stations that are next to the highway. In places like that you usually can’t put a fast charger just like that, you first need to adapt the grid. So the grid operator has to do some work first. So it should be planned and coordinated so that the charging network grows in a way that makes sense. As far as I know this wasn’t done.
Blame das idiots at VW. Same problem in Canada with the Electrify network. If governments seriously want EVs, they need to get their thumbs out and treat charge infrastructure like they treated handicapped parking.
Overnight, under threat of real fines, handicapped parking was everywhere, and maintained.
In Spain the government straight out said that they don’t care about the network, that private companies should solve it. And they did, in the most corporate way possible, absolutely enshittified, terrible for users, great for profit. I really believe some of the companies keep their chargers as broken as possible to promote ICE cars.
EU passed some common sense laws (mandatory card payment, open APIs with availability info) but so far they were just ignored. There’s also mandatory chargers every 50km on some highways but the law was passed years ago and the Spanish government is just now planning to build 3 charging stations as a trial. And that’s the leftist government we’re talking about. I can’t wait what will happen when the right wing party takes over in a year or two.
It EV are supposed to be a tool to make as dependent on shitty corpos like Google (you need Android phone to use chargers) I don’t want it. But there’s still chance EU’s regulation will take effect and it will be usable. We’ll see.
They can still legislate minimum number charging stations in parking lots and fine for lack of function. Just use find and replace on handicap parking laws.
Chargers at parking lots are very common and it’s not the problem. When you’re driving on a highway you don’t want to go to a parking in the center of the city to charger there. You will loose 30-60 minutes just to get in and out of the town. Chargers are needed at service stations that are next to the highway. In places like that you usually can’t put a fast charger just like that, you first need to adapt the grid. So the grid operator has to do some work first. So it should be planned and coordinated so that the charging network grows in a way that makes sense. As far as I know this wasn’t done.