Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by twblalock 2722 days ago
Other brands have dealerships all over the country where they could install chargers. I'd say the barrier to doing that is pretty low.

For example, if every BMW or Audi dealership had some charging spots for owners of their cars, it would probably have more nationwide coverage than Tesla's Supercharger network. The dealerships are also frequently located in convenient places near major highway exits, etc.

3 comments

You don't go charge a car to a dealership though. I charged mine yesterday in the parking structure next to the mall in Colma while getting ice cream with my son. Sorry but no, that's not a valid suggestion.
I'm assuming most electric car owners would charge their cars at home and make use of Superchargers/dealership chargers on road trips.

Being able to charge at your local shopping center is nice but it's not a necessity for electric car ownership.

I think you're underestimating the proportion of potential EV owners in situations which preclude charging at home.
*Could

Even if people wanted to charge at dealerships, dealerships aren't incentivized to sell electric cars, much less charge them.

The proof is that any Chevy dealer that sells the Bolt should have a public charger already, but I'm guessing few do.

I live in Seattle, east of here there is one BMW dealer on my way home and next closest BMW dealer is in Boise, Idaho. I can’t drive to my home town and visit a dealership. That means an electric BMW would need a range of 1,000-1,200 miles to be remotely comparable to an ICE car or Tesla.

Putting universal chargers at existing gas stations or buying an entire brand and converting to charging makes way more sense.

Gas stations are obviously a great place for chargers because they're already properly distributed along well travelled routes. I think there's probably going to be a market for either an existing restaurant coffee chain with a lot of existing real estate (or perhaps a new chain that's a bit more upscale) to partner with Tesla and any of the other electric car manufacturers and build a concept around high quality food with quick turn around (like order ahead and eat in under the time it takes your car to charge). Gas stations as they currently exist can be pretty bleak places to spend 30 minutes
Chevron stations in Las Vegas have EV chargers. Of course, they also have tiny casinos, so there's something to do while your car charges.
There are five BMW dealerships in Washington, including three within 30 miles of Seattle:

* Seattle

* Bellevue

* Fife

Except for the BMW dealership in Yakima you mean?

Or if you go via PDX.

PDX is the opposite direction of my part of Idaho from Seattle. Taking that route would add hundreds of miles.

The dealer in the tri cities or Yakima is out of the way and the one in Spokane would add a couple hours of driving time.

There are no dealers on the direct route home for me. Realistically I could only stop at one.