[Grant Thomas]

Whiteley Shopping (Link: http://www.whiteleyshopping.co.uk) is a major retail centre adjacent to M27 Junction 9, equidistant between Portsmouth and Southampton. It reopened in May last year after an £84m rebuild (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-22636016). They currently have 2 PodPoint posts which have been unreliable and which failed to work when I organised a South Coast EV meet (#SoCEV) last year forcing EV Drivers from as far afiled as Bristol to charge from Commando plugs around the site. Since then I have been in periodic contact with Whiteley Village who are keen to positively promote electric car charging at the location.

Whiteley Shopping are now building a new multi-screen cinema on site resulting in the loss of one of the Pod Point charging posts. They have approached me about hosting a Rapid Charger as this is what EV drivers visiting Whiteley are demanding, Ecotricity are leading the strategic roll-out of a Nationwide network of Rapid Chargers and I think it would be a game changer if Ecotriicty could install a charger at Whiteley. Hampshire County Council have completely mis-planned the M27 corridor with no Rapid Charging from the Ecotricity installation at Rownhams Services until East of Chichester where West Sussex county council have indicated they may install a Rapid Charger.

EV drivers - please vote and give feedback as to how important such an installation would be........

 

[James]

With the lack of service stations down there I think this would be great. Travelling from the New Forest to Portsmouth it is near on impossible now as I refuse to pay the extortionate prices Chargemaster have to offer and GunWharf Quays polar charge stations are often offline due to 'no signal' in their underground car park. I'm sure one day it will be possible to travel from Southampton to Brighton in a Leaf with ease.

 

[Kevin Sharpe]

I think you need defined service levels and redundancy if you want driver support. More of the same is just not good enough IMO.

 

[Grant Thomas]

I think you need defined service levels and redundancy if you want driver support. More of the same is just not good enough IMO.

So 2 or 3 x 7kw Type 2 Mennekes sockets donated by Zero Carbon World as additional charging / redundancy?

 

[Kevin Sharpe]

So 2 or 3 x 7kw Type 2 Mennekes sockets donated by Zero Carbon World as additional charging / redundancy?

I'm happy to support any public charging initiative that meets drivers needs... personally, I would like to see this as part of a coordinated EVDA strategy

I would recommend 22kW Type 2 as the redundancy so that we can encourage 'fast' AC cars to leave the rapid chargers for those that can use them.

 

[Grant Thomas]

I'm happy to support any public charging initiative that meets drivers needs... personally, I would like to see this as part of a coordinated EVDA strategy

Ah well the Chair of the EVDA @Matt Beard knows Whiteley well after his Scotland to South Coast trip. Look at any charging map, both current and planned; and there's a huge hole along the South Coast that this location is right in the middle of!

 

[SanSerif]

I'm near Whiteley - so make it a CCS and I might even try it.

I'd prefer to see chargers put in more interesting places than m-way services and shopping centres. That's not a recommendation - just a personal preference to spend "waiting" time in a local coffee shop than a service station or yet-another-Costa.

 

[John Ganderton]

If I'm ever in the area and need a charge and it's got a CCS plug I'll use it

 

[snfosberry]

I would answer yes and no.... (but will choose yes)

I have personally suggested it as a location to Ecotricity twice. They seemed receptive. Ironically, Whiteley is more or less at the point on the M27 where the services were planned and never built.

If it was there I would use it. I drive past at least twice a day. The A/M27 west of the M3 is a desert. There is Nissan at Waterloovile, but that's a bit out of the way. There are no other RCs, and lots and lots of people!

But...

I've moaned on twitter about the placement of Electric Highway RCs. Personally, I don't think they should be put in shopping locations, especially IKEA. A typical visit is not suited to using a RC. You arrive, park and walk away, Probably for more than 2 hours. Your visit is much more suited to a 32A unit, dozens of which could be provided for the same cost. I've tried to do the right thing a couple of times when there and move after 30-45 mins, first time I couldn't find another space, the second as I drove away an ICE pulled in to the empty RC spot (the other was already ICEd) another time I arrived to find 2 leafs parked one had charged an the finished, the other was flap closed. I squeezed on the hatching at the end and managed to charge!

I've now used the Pod Point posts at Whiteley a number of times. All have been without issue. (I did call the helpline once to ask some questions about their online map not updating and the posts being shown in the wrong place, the girl at the other end suggested I use zap-map instead of their map. neither of the posts at this location are even shown on zap-map :-s ) If they will allow more points to be put in, ZCW units could be a good choice!

For the RC, in the absence of any other suitable highway location, then yes. Go for it, put in a RC. I would certainly use it. Just don't install it *instead* of a load of type 2s, put them all in!

 

[SteepJim]

We are very poorly served in the South (Petersfield). There is not a single rapid the entire length of the A3 dual carriageway and the M27 has nothing until you reach Southampton. A Whitely rapid charger would get my vote!

 

[snfosberry]

There is a rapid planned for central Petersfield by HCC, but it will be operated by SSE as PAYG so don't expect much change from a tenner!

 

[Kevin Sharpe]

For the RC, in the absence of any other suitable highway location, then yes. Go for it, put in a RC. I would certainly use it. Just don't install it *instead* of a load of type 2s, put them all in!

IMO this really needs to be a part of a national strategy supported by EV drivers. We all have very different charging requirements and I think this needs to be recognised if we are going to all get behind a project

 

[SteepJim]

@snosberry where do I find out more about their plans for a charger in Petersfield? My local HCC Councillor? Is it too late to lobby them?

 

[SanSerif]

All done and dusted, SteepJim. IIRC, it's going in the "Central car park" according to some report I read a while back.

 

[snfosberry]

@Kevin Sharpe - is there a strategy? Who is coordinating it?

@SteepJim - it was due to go live pretty soon...

 

[Kevin Sharpe]

@Kevin Sharpe - is there a strategy? Who is coordinating it?

If drivers want one then they'll have to create it (or influence those people who are)... my suggestion is that drivers join EVDA and provide the resources it needs

 

[James12]

I got this reply when I asked HCC where the Petersfield Rapid charger is. HCC were given £315K in August 2013 from the Office for Low Emission Vehicles.

http://www3.hants.gov.uk/hantswebnewslist.htm?id=599400

Sutton Scotney seems very close to the existing M3 Moto rapid Chargers.

Dear James,


Thank you very much for your correspondence. I can confirm that some OLEV funded chargepoints are currently being installed in Hampshire by the County Council, with a view to some chargepoints being available for use by members of the public by the end of July.


Unfortunately we have been unable to progress some of the original sites that you may have heard about due to technical issues. For example the demands on the local grid at the Petersfield Central Car Park were already sufficiently high that we would have needed to pay for a grid upgrade, which would have doubled the cost of installation to a point where OLEV funding could no longer cover it. We are however, still investigating further possible options for a chargepoint to be located in East Hampshire.


When our chargepoints are installed, we plan to copy local EV drivers and other interested parties into the Press Release, so you can see where the chargepoints are. I will add your details to this list.


For info, the chargepoints will also be on the Charge Your Car (CYC) network, so will additionally be mapped here as and when they go live:http://chargeyourcar.org.uk/


Best Regards,


Daniel Hunt Senior Project Officer Energy & Environment Futures Hampshire County Council Tel: 01962 832273

 

[James12]

More info...

Dear all,


I am writing to you as a resident that has previously expressed an interest in electric vehicle chargepoints in Hampshire, particularly those that are funded by the Office for Low Emission Vehicles.


The procurement and installation of chargepoints has been a slow process, but I am happy to confirm that at this moment in time 5 rapid chargepoints have been installed, and now are awaiting grid connection and commissioning before becoming available to members of the public (commissioning is the process whereby the back office providers set all of their functions to ‘live’, i.e. payments, online mapping). They are in the following towns:


Ringwood

Romsey

Andover

Farnborough

Fareham


We have also installed chargepoint on the Isle of Wight (Newport), as well as a chargepoint in Oxfordshire (the local authorities in question partnered with Hampshire County Council in securing funding).


You may note that these locations are quite different to the original list that was published. Some of the original locations fell through after new uncertainties arose about the future of the sites, whilst in another example we came up against mounting costs caused by pressures on the local grid.


The process of grid connection and commissioning will happen from the start of next week. Look out for a press release later on in the month of August, this will make you aware of the confirmed availability of the chargepoints, as well as details about exact locations, payments, mapping of wider networks etc. I will also send another email to alert you to this.


Two further things to add –


1) The above 5 do not represent the end of chargepoint installation in Hampshire yet, some 7kW chargepoints are to follow shortly, and there remains a possibility to install a further rapid chargepoint. In particular we will look to add infrastructure in areas not currently covered by the 5 chargepoints above.

2) In previous communications with some of you I have alluded to ChargeYourCar (CYC) being the chosen back office provider for these chargepoints. In a recent change, we will instead be using Chargepoint Services, who are the providers of back office functions for the network of chargepoints at motorway service station.


Best Regards,


Daniel Hunt Senior Project Officer Energy & Environment Futures Hampshire County Council

 

[Grant Thomas]

Yup I got the same email. If only the pricing was there. In recent discussion I think £7.50 or thereabouts will be the resultant cost for a public rapid charge.

**Yes we know all cars use different amounts of kW and wouldn't it be great if they all charged per kWh as they are legally able to do yada yada

 

[Matt Beard]

Show them what York are doing!!