Have you been ICEd? Gas guzzlers park in electric car-charging spots.
One electric-car owner got so angry about internal combustion engine (ICE) cars taking car-charging parking spots, he made a video.
One of the first production all-electric CODA EV cars sits in the parking structure at the Westfield Century City Mall in Los Angeles, Calif., in this March file photo. Increasingly, electric-car owners are complaining that such designated electric-vehicle parking spots are being occupied by conventional gas-powered cars.
Bret Hartman/Reuters/File
If you drive an electric car, it's nice to know that if you're making a trip to the mall or a regular spot that you can charge up your car while you're running errands.
Well, it's nice until you get there to find that some ignorant soul has parked their gas-guzzler in the space, preventing you from charging.
Unfortunately, it's a trend noticed all too frequently by Santa Monica-based reader Kelly Olsen, who shot the video below to demonstrate just how many spaces are being hogged, in a trend he dubs "ICEing"-- in other words, being displaced by vehicles with Internal Combustion Engines.
The video shows cars at three business locations near to Kelly's home, which all use ECOtality Blink chargers. Not a single car featured in the video is a plug-in, but all are taking up plug-in spaces.
He describes it as a particular problem in Santa Monica, where "a segment of the population feels entitled to anything they want because of their L.A. 'me first' attitude", and he's currently working with Santa Monica City staff and parking enforcement to work on signage and enforcement.
In the meantime, plenty of other electric car owners are getting "ICEd" by inconsiderate drivers parking in EV-only spaces, and whether through ignorance or self-entitlement it certainly puts a cloud over plug-in ownership.
Have you ever been "ICEd"? Share your parking experiences in the comments section below.