The Week in Mobility - 28 May 2021

Last week I harboured an almighty grudge towards electric vehicles. Working in the Electric Vehicle industry and frequently harping on about their virtues; this blasphemous statement is arguably the equivalent of a hardcore vegan caught eating a bacon butty. 

I was staying in a treehouse 10 miles from Exeter on a farm so peppered with potholes, any number of them could have doubled up as a hot tub. It was gloriously remote, completely devoid of neighbours and 3G. The weather was (mainly) abysmal, but armed with a staggering arsenal of board games the rain wasn’t going to dampen our spirits. 

Charging the car during this delightful sojourn however, was absolutely capable of not only dampening spirits, as much as completely saturating them. A trip to Mothecombe beach was followed by a frantic ZapMap foray (an app about as usable as teletext) which took us to a 40 minute charge at a miserable leisure centre car park. Stuck in the car in the pouring rain with a limp packet sandwich, romantic visions of a Range Rover made their way unsolicited into my grumpy day dream. The reverie was quickly superseded by enormous guilt for even considering this almighty gas guzzling, NO2 spitting behemoth.  

The next day we experienced greater success at Darts Farm where there were 8 or so Tesla Superchargers. Darts Farm is a local farm shop where you can spend an inordinate amount on 100g of locally produced cheese and mugs that say things like “I’ll be in my shed” or “This isn’t tea, it’s Prosecco!!”. I was unsurprised to see that the facility was expanding to include a Cotswolds Outdoors shop. Overall, a considerably more convenient and enjoyable charging experience but accompanied by overpriced chutneys. 

It makes sense to have Tesla chargers in nice places. The people that use them are more likely to have enough disposable income to mooch around and drop ￡50 on local asparagus. However, it’s not a way to make electric vehicles accessible to everyone who wants to make the switch. The weekend proved to us that not having an electric vehicle charger at home can be a real ballache - something that will particularly impact the 25% of households in the UK that don’t have access to off-street parking. 

However, hope does not have to be lost. Last year Airbnb launched the City Portal as a means to give governments and tourism organisations the data and tools they need to understand Airbnb listings and community activity. It is clear that this is partly motivated by Airbnb’s anticipation of rentals for remote working and creating a way to influence cities’ management of short-term rental policies. It would take very little for Airbnb to evolve their platform to include driveway rental for electric vehicle charging. Better than that, the city portal could serve as a conduit to funnel EV charging point grants and installation for driveway boasting participants. For those that can’t afford installation, Airbnb could cover the cost and recoup it from the revenue generated by users. I’m biased but I think this could just have legs, or at the very least maybe toes. 

Elsewhere in the industry

• Germany gives the green light to driverless vehicles by 2022 - TechCrunch
• A $10 billion federal bill will make transit stations more accessible - Smart Cities Dive
• Waze and TfL have partnered on a safety alert system - Cities Today
• What robots can and can’t do for the lonely - The New Yorker
• What MaaS could mean for accessibility - Forbes
• Ford Reveal the all electric F-150 Lighting - Ford
• Foxconn and Stellantis partner to make personalised connected services - Stellantis
• Fisker is making an electric popemobile - Verge
• BYD’s first 100 passenger vehicle Tang EVs have been shipped to Norway - Inside EVs
• MassRobotics publishes world’s first open source autonomous mobile robot interoperability standards - Yahoo Finance
• Sidewalk labs launches Pebble to provide live parking space availability information - TechCrunch
• (Apparently) Canoo’s electric microbus will be under $35,000 when it comes to market next year - TechCrunch
• Reducing speed, reduces congestion - Smart Cities Dive
• Two and three wheeler EVs are low hanging fruit in Africa - WSJ
• 60-75% of users of shared mobility services are men - electrive
• Public transit in rural communities is terrible - Cities Today
• Worthy of your time - Gender and Urban Mobility in India (SPACE10)

Miscellaneous 

AI:Da the humanoid robot has an exhibition at The Design Museum in London showcasing her self-portraits. Unconvinced it’s art? Watch this TedX Talk about the intersection of AI and Art.