A few months after getting our all-electric Nissan Leaf, I was incensed to see seven of eight EV (electric vehicle) parking spaces next to chargers in Salem's Chemeketa Parkade filled with gasoline powered cars.
Jim Motavalli, a writer who specializes in green car topics, wrote an interesting article on this subject: "Caught on tape! Gas cars parking in electric vehicle spots."
Not surprisingly, the part I found most interesting was his mention of me.
Jim and I exchanged some emails about EV parking and why we sold our Nissan Leaf to buy a Chevy Volt. He sent me a link to a piece on Green Car Reports, "Like the Plug, Not the Range: Leaf Owner Trades in for Volt (Ampera)."
I hope the Leaf succeeds. Sales are pretty slim, though.
They'll be even worse if electric cars don't get the designated parking space respect that handicapped spots do. So please: don't park in an EV charging space if you don't have an electric car.
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The obvious solution to this problem is to install parking meters at the EV parking spaces. This way, the EV owners will spend a small portion of the savings realized by driving an EV on enforcement of the parking rules. ICE-equipped vehicle owners will get tired of the tickets and avoid them by habit, eventually.
The only remaining problem will be – where to locate the EV spaces without giving preferential treatment to EV owners.