By Scott Etkin
The global transition from cars that run on fossil fuels to electric vehicles (EVs) is underway, but it’s happening at an uneven pace depending on where you live. The new year offers an opportunity to track how this shift is progressing in our neighborhood.
In 2022, 357 electric vehicles were registered in the 10023, 10024, 10025 and 10069 zip codes, bringing the total number of EVs on the UWS to 1,038.* There were 11 more EVs registered in 2022 than in 2021.
In 2022, 60% of the EVs registered were fully electric vehicles and 40% were electric hybrids. The split was nearly the same in 2021.
The most common fully electric EV brand on the UWS is Tesla and the most popular plug-in hybrid is the Toyota RAV4.
It will be interesting to see how EV sales track in 2023. This year could see an increase as automakers release more electric models and the $7,500 EV tax credit kicks in from the Inflation Reduction Act. Mayor Adams’ recent announcement that more than $10 million in federal grants will be used toward installing 315 new EV chargers across the city, as well as replacing 925 fossil fuel-powered NYC fleet vehicles with EVs, could also be a boost for the neighborhood’s EV drivers who are looking for more charging options.
*Numbers are from ChargeNY, a collaboration between the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, New York Power Authority and New York State Department of Environmental Conservation.
Maybe there would be room for EV chargers if they got rid of the restaurant shanties.
DOWN with shanties, UP with ferrets!
The real question is, what is the percentage of EV cars to regular ones, and why should we allocate a lot of charging space to these vehicles? These are luxury vehicles.
A Tesla Model 3 starts at $43K. A Kia Niro EV starts at under $39K. A Chevy Bolt is under $26K. In a world where the average new car is over $40K, how are these luxury cars?
Not all EV cars are luxury a poor argument to imply all EV owners are more well off than ICE automobile owners.
Projection for the US is half the cars sales by 2030 will be EV. NY no emission law will come into affect in 2035. The average car lasts 12 years.
If no parking permit for NYC is implemented most ICE cars will be ones that have out state plates and/or older vehicles since you won’t be able to register a new ICE vehicle in 2035.
When/if congestion pricing gets implemented I can also see NYC banning ICE passenger vehicles in the CBD by 2035.
They will never meet this net zero goal. These false promises are only to please elite business interests that want the streets for themselves and for us lemmings to own nothing and be happy. If we aggressively switch to electric vehicles we face a real threat of a copper and nickel shortage which is not getting the attention it deserves right now. If that happens, watch our coins disappear from circulation as they are all made of copper and nickel.
I am reasonably sure that some of the charging costs will be passed on to NYC which is more than what NYC receives from all of the other Cars parking on our streets for free.
Cars parking on the streets for free. People using parks for free. Bicycles using bike lanes for free. Some museums in ny are free for new yorkers. Dinning shanties using sidewalks for free. Lets equip every new yorker with a personal ez pass and start charging these freeloaders
“free”? really? car owners pay gas tax, registration fees, license fees – EVs pay NO gas tax, but use the roads for free (i.e., they use streets but pay NOTHING for maintenance). Is this fair? As a car owner and tax payer, I don’t like how some of my taxes are spent (or wasted, more accurately), but I have no power over this. Everyone pays taxes and have issues with how they are spent – what you might not like, I do and vice versa, This is not a black and white situation.
That percentage of EV cars to ICVs, Wendy, whatever it is, is but a snapshot in time.
EV’s are a new technology, one not yet highly adopted, but with tremendous promise to, among other things, help restore climate balance by diminishing our carbon footprint, thus slowing the rise of oceans which by the way threatens NYC directly, especially downtown, and also may well diminish the rapacious desire of Putin’s Russia (fueled largely by petroleum sales) to utterly destroy the Ukrainian people.
Therefore this technology should be given every encouragement that government can offer to flower and grow, because currently a chicken and egg conundrum is at work today: people don’t buy EVs because there’s not enough charging stations on the streets, and there’s not enough charging stations on the streets because there’s not enough EVs in need of them.
This must change radically.
In the suburbs, where people have their own garages of course it’s different but here in the city the numbers of charging stations must grow exponentially to encourage the sales of these vehicles in order to save this planet, as there’s no planet B towards which we could flee.
They will be sitting there without power when we have daily brown outs in our near future. All ready happening in southern California. My brother just bought a generator with a 2000 gallon propane tank because of the outrages in his area.
You mean the way dead cars sat without gasoline during the Arab oil embargoes during the 1970s, when the last number on your license plate indicated which days of the week you were able to spend those hours on long gas lines, to finally buy some energy for your vehicle and even got to watch some poor souls push their dead cars into the filling stations in that sweaty summer heat? Is that what you mean?
Everything old becomes new again… yet here I am, still waiting for men’s bellbottom pants to come back again. Very comfortable!
Whatever you do, don’t remind me about elephant bells over McCreedy & Schreiber boots!
Everything since has been a denouement or better yet an anticlimax…
Not real need for EVs on the UWS. Its not like the locally owned cars with gasoline engines create much pollution since most are just used to go from one side of the street to the other on alternate side parking days.
Locally owned cars owned by westsiders are used for a variety of reasons. Some are used to commute to jobs outside of manhattan , not well served by public transportation. Some are used to transport tools and supplies not suitable for public transportation.. think of painters, plumbers. Some are used by people who like to travel outside of the city on weekends. Unfortunately most uws residents cant afford $1000 per month for a garage.
And you know this supposed fact how?
You’re positing a situation Sisyphean in scope where people spend large sums of money to repeatedly move from one side of the street to the other, then back again?
Why would anybody in their right mind do that, save as some bizarre form of Rube Goldberg penance scheme to pay an endless toll for previous or ongoing sins?
The mind boggles at the very thought of GOD or gods finding favor through such thoughtless and even destructive activities, but hey who really knows?
Try as they might, progressives will not be able to rid themselves of their guilt by purchasing an electric powered vehicle, by putting a few dozen charging stations in Manhattan, or by getting rid of a few more parking spaces. More importantly, none of these actions will bring about the smallest reduction in global warming. (Okay, maybe .0000000000001 percent.)
They ”signal virtue” and make for cocktail party conversation. And are good for political campaigns in certain districts.
Get rid of the restaurant sheds and garbage on the UWS and replace with charging stations.