I took my non-Tesla EV to a Supercharger yesterday to try out the A2Z adapter. I’m planning a road trip around Thanksgiving and wanted to make sure everything worked as expected.
When I got there, I had to block two stalls (required for the adapter). I immediately felt bad because the station was busy. So I moved my car and waited for an end spot to open, but as soon as I left, a Lightning pulled into the same spot, blocking both stalls and started charging.
After waiting for a while, two side-by-side spots opened up, so I parked, blocked both, and started charging. I only planned to stay for 5-10 minutes to check if everything worked. By then, the station was full, and I noticed a few Teslas circling around looking for spots. One guy parked nearby looked pretty mad and was talking to himself while staring over at me, but he didn’t say anything. Another older couple approached, visibly upset, but after I explained the short cable issue, they seemed to calm down and even asked me about the car. After I finished my test, I left, but as I was leaving, a woman in a Model Y flipped me off. I waved and smiled.
I wonder if Tesla drivers don’t know about the short cable situation and assume I was just being rude? With a Rivian circling and the Lightning taking up two spots, it seems like it’s becoming a more common sight. I also think the Tesla app might be giving drivers a false idea of availability since it doesn’t seem to register two stalls being blocked by non-Teslas.
The problem is Tesla’s system doesn’t account for cars blocking spots. So, it still shows two stalls as available when they’re really not because you’re blocking one. The app keeps routing cars there, which leads to the frustration you’re seeing. If the app registered the spots as full, it would reroute people to another station. I get why people would be annoyed.
@Randy
This should be easy to fix, right? They could just program the system to know which cars have to block an extra stall and adjust the availability info accordingly. Or at least give a warning that this might happen.
@diallo
Some of the money can be used for expanding existing stations, but they have to use a non-proprietary standard like CCS. That’s why Tesla rolled out Magic Dock, and the whole reason they rushed NACS before it was fully ready.
@Peggy
The NEVI funds are for new chargers, and Tesla has been awarded some contracts for those. But as far as I know, they haven’t finished installing any yet. The V4 design addresses a lot of these issues.
Robert said: @abidemi
Tesla should’ve fixed this before they opened the chargers to other brands.
Tesla has always benefited from government money. Same reason they had that battery swap tax credit thing, where they closed the swap stations as soon as the loophole was fixed.