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Original poster

Electric Car No Driveway

100 replies

Squishybopbadobop · 06/08/2023 22:08

Ourselves and the house we are attached to are the only ones on the street with no driveway so if we asked for electric charging points to be put outside our house, would it give us any right to park in the spaces outside our house (on the road) as we don't have a driveway? Presumably the council would only install them outside our houses as everyone else could install them on their driveways but not sure how this would work?

OP posts:
morelippy · 06/08/2023 22:09

I don't think they'd install them just cos you want them.

morelippy · 06/08/2023 22:11

And wouldn't public charging points make it even less 'your' spot. You'd be unable to park in it unless you were charging?

Lochroy · 06/08/2023 22:11

No, it wouldn't.

Who would you be asking to put one in? If you're paying for installation then I'm sure any company would willingly take your money but you wouldn't necessarily be able to use it.

I don't think you op could trail a charging cable over the pavement either.

This is a big problem with the move to electric.

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Cars & vehicles
Legoroses · 06/08/2023 22:17

You can ask your local authority to consider your street for charging points, and they can be very unobtrusive lamppost points. (Big shout out to chargy who do these and have been super useful for me lately.) Then you need to be lucky/have considerate neighbours/plenty of spare parking. I only need to charge once a week, so you don't need to be a lucky nabber of the electric spots every night. Is a good idea to factor in having to charge when you're away from home/nearby sometimes in that set up though.

Original poster
Squishybopbadobop · 06/08/2023 22:17

@morelippy I think the councils are able to get funding to install them to try to encourage people to change to electric cars where they don't have a driveway. That's a good point about it being more a space just for charging I hadn't thought of that.
@Lochroy there's a scheme where the council install them so I was thinking of that (if we change to electric) but doesn't sound like it has been that we'll thought out so probably best to wait!

OP posts:
Polik · 06/08/2023 22:17

I've thought about this for the future. When our older teens both have their own car, they will be on the road and ours on the drive. How will charging work when there are 3 or 4 cars in thr household?

Legoroses · 06/08/2023 22:20

Polik - unless everyone in your house is driving 250 miles a day, you can just swap around the driveway parking depending on who needs a charge. You don't want to leave them on 100% - it's not ideal for the battery.

eyeblob · 06/08/2023 22:21

I wondered about this, I used to have a flat in a city and often couldn't park in same road as my home.

Legoroses · 06/08/2023 22:24

Squishybopbadobop · 06/08/2023 22:17

@morelippy I think the councils are able to get funding to install them to try to encourage people to change to electric cars where they don't have a driveway. That's a good point about it being more a space just for charging I hadn't thought of that.
@Lochroy there's a scheme where the council install them so I was thinking of that (if we change to electric) but doesn't sound like it has been that we'll thought out so probably best to wait!

Parking beside lamppost chargers is often not exclusively set aside for electric cars/charging, so I guess the local authority can make a judgement on whether to have an exclusive bay.

gogomoto · 06/08/2023 22:26

I've enquired, no not reserved for you but our council will put a "reserved for charging" sign up, means you are expected to move it once charged

StillWantingADog · 06/08/2023 22:28

Polik · 06/08/2023 22:17

I've thought about this for the future. When our older teens both have their own car, they will be on the road and ours on the drive. How will charging work when there are 3 or 4 cars in thr household?

You’ll have to move them around
but our car only needs charging generally once a fortnight or so.

AuntieJune · 06/08/2023 22:28

I live in an area with terraces with miniscule gardens and plenty of people run a charging cable over the pavement with either a doormat or a thick plastic bumper type thing over it. People use that or there are a few charging bays around, or I guess you can charge at car parks.

fullbloom87 · 06/08/2023 22:32

I wouldn't bother with an electric car as they're unethical due to the child labour used for mass production of batteries and the lack of ability to recycle the batteries.

StillWantingADog · 06/08/2023 22:33

You could also your council to install bur I wouldn’t get too excited yet

othwr installers will insist on putting one on your land I think. A cable between your house and where you park is a theoretical possibility but lots of issues with this.

I was speaking to a Dutch friend the other day and there if you don’t have one within 250m (I think) of your house then the council will come and install one outside your house (which won’t be technically yours but might as well be) for free. We could learn a thing or two from them.

WaxhamSeals · 06/08/2023 22:36

AuntieJune · 06/08/2023 22:28

I live in an area with terraces with miniscule gardens and plenty of people run a charging cable over the pavement with either a doormat or a thick plastic bumper type thing over it. People use that or there are a few charging bays around, or I guess you can charge at car parks.

I’ve complained to the council about cables being run across the pavement. Either the cable is just loose which is a trip hazard, or the cable covers make the pavement too bumpy for wheelchair users.

user1477249785 · 06/08/2023 23:12

I think there's a lot of scare tactics on electric cars. I use mine daily and charge it max once a week. Sometimes I forget and it goes a fortnight.

But I think op if your question is more about how to secure parking than how to make the transition to electric, then this isn't the solution you hope.

healthadvice123 · 06/08/2023 23:52

The infrastructure is not here for people charging cars and more houses in uk don’t have a driveway than do , we have a long way to go

namechange100000003 · 06/08/2023 23:54

I've seen people with street parking bring the cable out their house here in London. So there must be a way to install it somewhere.

Original poster
Squishybopbadobop · 07/08/2023 09:13

@user1477249785 that's exactly it, its about securing the parking for charging because if everyone else has a driveway, the council would be less likely to just install loads of them on the road (if it were approved) so I'd have thought they'd only install them outside mine and/or my neighbours for us to charge but then if we weren't able to park there reliably every night because neighbours guests parked there, we wouldn't be able to charge it. We will stick with our car as long as possible now but I just wondered if we did need to convert to electric, how this would possibly work.

OP posts:
MaggieFS · 07/08/2023 09:44

Squishybopbadobop · 07/08/2023 09:13

@user1477249785 that's exactly it, its about securing the parking for charging because if everyone else has a driveway, the council would be less likely to just install loads of them on the road (if it were approved) so I'd have thought they'd only install them outside mine and/or my neighbours for us to charge but then if we weren't able to park there reliably every night because neighbours guests parked there, we wouldn't be able to charge it. We will stick with our car as long as possible now but I just wondered if we did need to convert to electric, how this would possibly work.

It's the crappy limbo land... you can't really have an electric car yet, because the infrastructure isn't really in place yet to enable you to do so, and you don't necessary want to fork out for a new petrol/diesel car because in a few years it will have to be to hit the government's targets on the transition to electric.

MaggieFS · 07/08/2023 09:45

(Which btw I personally don't see happening because of exactly situations like yours and no serious push for provision of charging points in sufficient numbers in public places).

Original poster
Squishybopbadobop · 07/08/2023 09:48

@MaggieFS that's right. It's probably like most things, there's an initial push to get as many people on board as possible by causing a bit of panic with a deadline but when it comes to it, they probably realise its not going to happen for everyone so I guess just sit and wait it out... like everything else!

OP posts:
JustFrustrated · 07/08/2023 10:04

Realistically do you drive 250 miles a day?

Realistically do you never pass anywhere with a charger?

No and no is the answer to both of those questions I'm guessing.

In which case, you really are worrying over nothing.

Public chargers are widely available and getting more so every month. It's All about planning. And I'll say it til I'm blue in the face, people shouldn't be driving 200 miles in one go without a break. Ever. And that break will now involve charging. If you get to an ionity charger you'd have charged a lot in the time it takes to get a coffee and have a wee.

I think we did 68% charge in 15 minutes at Ionity the other day.

coreas · 07/08/2023 10:17

The council are not gonna install a charger outside your house because you don't have a drive.

User1755387908 · 07/08/2023 10:22

i can't see the council putting private use chargers outside houses, most houses don't even have permit parking for their own space.

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