Plug-Side Chat: Why EV Trip Planners Suck

From News Coulomb.

Tell us how you really feel, Eric.

Well… I don’t personally use EV trip planners (route planners as they are sometimes called), and I think that in their current form, they are largely unnecessary. Most require the driver to know enough about their car and their route that the trip planner itself becomes unnecessary. The trip planners that don’t require the driver to have a deep understanding of their vehicle and route add a premium cost, and they are sometimes limited to specific, isolated networks of chargers.

Even without that, trip planners have a couple of fundamental flaws that are largely unavoidable. The first is that they do not provide a qualitative assessment of the site. At best, the display the information that the charging providers themselves have published, but that is not always an accurate reflection of the site. It also doesn’t necessarily reflect the experiences of actual EV drivers.

Finally, at a base level, EV trip planners are designed to set up an ideal trip for the CAR, not the driver or passengers. It can’t anticipate the occupants’ needs beyond getting to the destination as quickly, economically, etc. as possible.

I have heard a number of EV journalists and influencers state that, without EV trip planners, EVs could never go mainstream. In my opinion, as long as EV trip planners are required in order for people to live with and drive EVs, EVs can’t go mainstream.