NC Leaf Owners

[copdoc]

"prepped" agonizingly slowly! One of those is mine and I can't have it yet.

 

[copdoc]

Tony, did you buy from Leith, too? I had my husband call yesterday: Nissan is there and is installing the boxes (started Monday 1/9), but they have to go through quality control (whatever that is) before we can have them.

Yes - I think the 40 Advanced Energy cars will be out there soon.

Thanks for sharing photos from the car get together on Saturday. Unfortunately, I will be out of town for the next one (and didn't know about the last one), and so cannot bring my "Blue ocean" Leaf to the party (for the color variation). Perhaps in March.... or is there interest in raking together a "Leaf pile" separate from the car thing?

I LOVE my Leaf!

Yes all the cars in the photo are all assigned to the Advanced Energy Study. They are currently in the process of putting in the GPS tracking units.

All of the cars in the Advanced Energy study have been assigned and purchased. The cars should be on the road within the two weeks.

I can't wait to get my car, it is starting to drive me a bit crazy. My wife has asked that I not talk about the car until it arrives. :roll:

Tony

 

[aedanna]

Tony, did you buy from Leith, too? I had my husband call yesterday: Nissan is there and is installing the boxes (started Monday 1/9), but they have to go through quality control (whatever that is) before we can have them.

I did buy from Leith as did all of the other Qualcomm employees except for one that didn't have a choice because he was selected as an alternate. In my personal opinion they were the best choice, the most professional, and were treating everyone the same.

I heard, although have not confirmed, that AE requested that all the cars are held until they are all ready. I'm not sure why they would do that.

I did go to the dealer and grabbed my manuals. I've had a bit of time to read them, but probably the first and last car manual that I will take out of the car and actually read.

 

[NuclearLeaf]

I got an email today from the North Hills Marketing Manager, concerning the charging stations they installed across from REI, she said: "They are going to have a ribbon cutting on Saturday, January 21st at 11am. Please do come out! And bring all of your EV driving comrades." It sounds like a great idea to me, lets get as many EVs out there as we can for the ribbon cutting. Let us show them some support for installing the chargers!!

If we can get a car count, I will forward her that information, and maybe they will block off an area just for the EVs.

 

[sarahnc]

I got an email today from the North Hills Marketing Manager, concerning the charging stations they installed across from REI, she said: "They are going to have a ribbon cutting on Saturday, January 21st at 11am. Please do come out! And bring all of your EV driving comrades." It sounds like a great idea to me, lets get as many EVs out there as we can for the ribbon cutting. Let us show them some support for installing the chargers!!

If we can get a car count, I will forward her that information, and maybe they will block off an area just for the EVs.

I'm in! See everyone there!!!

--Sarah

 

[harryjpowell]

Wish we could make it but plans will block it . I'll definitely visit the next week and see how "open" the spaces are.

 

[lpickup]

If we can get a car count, I will forward her that information, and maybe they will block off an area just for the EVs.

Thanks for posting. I got an e-mail this afternoon too. I'll be there.

 

[lspooz]

.....North Hills Marketing Manager, concerning the charging stations they installed across from REI, she said: "They are going to have a ribbon cutting on Saturday, January 21st at 11am. Please do come out! And bring all of your EV driving comrades." It sounds like a great idea to me, lets get as many EVs out there as we can for the ribbon cutting. Let us show them some support for installing the chargers!! ....

Love this idea, but to ALSO suggest a challenge and to demonstrate that there might be sufficient demand for more chargers - rather than organize EV meetings at places that already have L2 chargers, why not set up meetings at shopping sites/restaurants that NEED a charger?? This could also be coordinated with a few emails/calls to the retailer or manager of that site. Seems like a better way to use the time involved in raking up a pile of LEAFs.

Larry from Greensboro (the city with ZERO public chargers... and apparently NO plans to install one at the expanding Greensboro Natural Science Center, nor at [uber-green] Proximity hotel...) Perhaps a LEAFpile at the local REI, or the Whole Foods [currently under construction]

 

[lpickup]

why not set up meetings at shopping sites/restaurants that NEED a charger?? This could also be coordinated with a few emails/calls to the retailer or manager of that site. Seems like a better way to use the time involved in raking up a pile of LEAFs.

That sounds good, but getting the decision makers to be present might be challenging. Many of the larger venues that would be candidates for charging stations are run by management companies (some of which are not local) and they also usually work the day shift. Granted, a tactic that may work is to contact the establishment owners, ask them about charging station availability for a coming gathering of EV owners and get THEM to pressure the management companies.

As for the North Hills event, I know that they are planning a press release in conjunction with their ribbon cutting (they asked me if they could quote an e-mail I sent them) and Progress Energy will be there with EVs and offer rides. So it's very possible that there will be some media presence there and having a great showing of EV owners there will do wonders at educating the public (and hopefully property managers!) that EVs are here in sufficient quantities and demand for charging stations at shopping centers is sufficient to justify their installation.

 

[jbowman3]

If we can get a car count, I will forward her that information, and maybe they will block off an area just for the EVs.

Thanks for posting. I got an e-mail this afternoon too. I'll be there.

I got the same email as well. I'll be there!

 

[copdoc]

We have an appointment to pick up the car on Tuesday! Talk about a long weekend.....

 

[harryjpowell]

Interesting story, we went by McDonalds for breakfast and just as we pulled up a 1990's honda civic pulled into the only non handicap charging parking spot. I politely asked him from my rolled down window if he would mind moving and allowing me to use the only charging spot for electric vehicles. He said I can park here, I'm allowed to because my car is low emissions. He did reluctantly move his car, my guess is the 5 year old he had in tow.

Funny to think that this guy thought his decade old honda was a low emissions vehicle. Anyway the issue is signage, I hope Northills Mall's parking signs are better than McDonalds.

Here's the problem signs, it's the lower one that seems to give people an excuse

 

[NuclearLeaf]

So is that a pay to use station? Do I need to get a ChargePoint card? I haven't done anything about getting a card, because I had not run into that type of charging station yet. Any information that you would like to share would be great.

 

[Herm]

Funny to think that this guy thought his decade old honda was a low emissions vehicle. Anyway the issue is signage, I hope Northills Mall's parking signs are better than McDonalds.

This has become a problem since CO2 was reclassified as pollution, thus even an ancient economy box is "low emissions" since it does not use much gas. The car is also a deathtrap compared to modern stuff.

 

[lpickup]

So is that a pay to use station? Do I need to get a ChargePoint card? I haven't done anything about getting a card, because I had not run into that type of charging station yet. Any information that you would like to share would be great.

I haven't been to that particular station, but it's very likely you do need a card and for now I suspect it is free (although McDonalds may choose to charge if they want--but seeing how they probably want to use it to draw in customers they probably won't). Go to chargepoint.net and request one. I think it does cost $5 for a card so it's not entirely free. You have a choice to also request an account where you "load" your card with funds to cover charging stations that do charge. I opted for this even though at the moment I don't believe there are any stations that actually charge.

I've been to two different Chargepoint charging stations: the ones at Qualcomm (which technically we probably aren't supposed to use) at Brier Creek and the ones at the American Tobacco Campus in downtown Durham (more on those later). Both were free but definitely required use of my Chargepoint card.

 

[lpickup]

Funny to think that this guy thought his decade old honda was a low emissions vehicle.

At our church there are 6-8 spots designated for "low emissions or alternative fuels". No signs, just paint on the pavement. Very ambiguous, and pretty much everyone ignores it anyway. I believe they were required to put those spots in adjacent to a new building in order for it to get LEED-Gold certification, but unfortunately they seem to have put the spots in simply because it was another check-mark on the LEED-Gold application, not because they really agree with the spirit of the rule, which does disappoint me. The silly thing is that these spots are not very highly desirable. They are located next to a mainly administrative school building that is not really near the main church building. During the week when the building is actually in use, the spots are roped off because they keep that section of the parking lot clear for schoolchildren to play outside. On weekends at the busy services those spots are not the ideal spots, but if you arrive late then yes it would be nice to be able to park there, but it's always full of SUVs, big vans, etc. And I don't really think the administration is at all serious about enforcing the rather ambiguous rule. It's kind of a weird situation, but your story reminded me of it. I'm also worried about downtown Raleigh because the city employee I spoke with told me there is no city ordinance that would allow them to specifically allow ONLY EV's in a particular spot, so their signage will only be worded as a recommendation.

 

[jbowman3]

The issue here is there is no state, county, or city law that prevents ICE vehicles from parking in EV charging designated parking spots, which to me is pointless to put them in if EV owners aren't able to actually use them. The state needs to pass a law whith specific verbage required for the sign as in handicap parking spots. Just give us EV owners a sticker and enforce parking tickets for all others. Till this happens, it's only going to get worse.

 

[harryjpowell]

You would think that with the investment they, city-county etc, would like to see the spots used for what they intended. Having said that, most of the monies were grants from Big Ob- so in practice who cares... Maybe as we have a higher ev community the issues will bubble up in city or county ordinances.

I got my ChargePoint network rfid card from Duke when they installed my garage EVSE. I have used it at McD, the rest-areas on 40 near Burlington and a few others, so definitely sign up and keep it handy.

How would one start a petition or drive for an EV parking ordinance for Raleigh, Apex, Morrisville, Durham and other cities? Or would a Wake & Durham county be a better level/jurisdiction?

 

[jbowman3]

How would one start a petition or drive for an EV parking ordinance for Raleigh, Apex, Morrisville, Durham and other cities? Or would a Wake & Durham county be a better level/jurisdiction?

I would think we should start at the state level and contact some of our state house reps and see if we can get one to sponsor a bill that establishes an EV charger parking spot standard, similar to handicap parking spot standards. If we can't get traction at the state level, then move on to our counties.

The issue that I see is funding required to establish EV charing spot stickers and administrative staff to review and approve applications, as well as an approved "EV and plug-in only" Sign standard. Maybe this can be offset by an application fee.

What I don't want to see is what happened in CA where they passed that bill that made it illegal to park in an EV spot if you are not plugged in. As our LEAF family grows here, I would thing that we want to establish plug-sharing in where you can unplug my car if I'm charged. But I don't want a ticket if someone does unplug me.

Thoughts?

 

[lpickup]

Charging station update: Durham American Tobacco Campus:

Went over to Durham to visit my aunt last Friday night. We could've made the round trip without a charge, but it's a bit tight for us round trip to Durham. So we went out to the ATC because of the availability of charging stations. There are 3 charging stations there. The charging stations are on plugshare.com and chargepoint.net web sites and apps, but briefly they are located on Carr St between the two decks on the west side of the ATC. It was a bit late on a cold night, but it was a Friday night. No problems at all with the spots being taken up (although even the parking decks were fairly deserted). It will be interesting to see if the spots are open during a ball game or DPAC event.

The signage is pretty good. It's a bit hard to see in this picture, but it clearly says: ELECTRIC VEHICLE USE ONLY I would like to see special striping or paint in the spots to really hit home, but it's not bad. No room for ambiguity about "low emission" vehicles.

These are Chargepoint units so you'll need a card to activate the unit. I had no trouble at all with the unit I plugged into. I was plugged in for 1:45 and got 6.5kWh of juice. I must've read the screen wrong because I thought it said I only got 3.5 when I left, but the actual SOC I left with (including a pre-heat) and the report on chargepoint.net indicates I got more, and this is in line with what I expected.

The spacing of the units is very nice allowing sharing of the charging station for multiple spots (i.e. they didn't put all 3 units in 3 adjacent spots). However, the signage could be interpreted such that the EV only spots were only the ones directly in front of the 3 units.

For those going there but who aren't familiar with the ATC, the amenities and DBAP are best reached by going south on Carr St and cutting over at the first set of stairs that go down (we weren't familiar and went north and around the "bays" blocking our access to the main ATC area, definitely the long way around). If you are going to a DPAC event you would want to head north and cut over that way.