Two rapid electric vehicle charging point sites are now ready for use in Thanet.
Alpha Road car park in Birchington and Market Street car park in Margate have a bay solely for taxi and private hire operators and a second bay for public use.
These are the first of 28 new charging points in Kent for use by taxis and the general public offering charging speeds of up to 50kwh – seven times faster than a typical home charger.
Future sites in Canterbury, Maidstone, Sevenoaks, Swale, and Tunbridge Wells will come into operation over the next few months.
Kent County Council was awarded £180,000 from the Office of Low Emission Vehicles (OLEV) to install the rapid chargers and has been working with district and borough councils to get them put in place.
KCC Cabinet Member for Highways and Transport Michael Payne said: “As we are committed to helping business shift towards electric vehicles, I’m delighted to see these charging points being installed, giving KCC another opportunity to act and help taxi firms switch to electric vehicles thereby reducing carbon emissions and traffic noise as well as improving air quality, which is a major concern for us all in Kent.”
KCC Cabinet Member for the Environment Susan Carey said: “We’re committed to improving the charging infrastructure and encouraging a shift towards low-emission vehicles.
“We’re currently working with our parish council partners to install chargers in smaller communities and have appointed Connected Kerb to carry out this work. Installations will begin at the start of 2021.
“Additionally we are developing a project to create a Kent wide EV charger network with our district and borough council partners.
“To date over 150 car park locations have been put forward for consideration and we’re hoping around 300 chargers will be installed by end of 2022.”
Cllr Rick Everitt, Leader of Thanet District Council, added: “It’s extremely positive that these new charging points have been installed in Thanet as we continue to take practical steps to help reduce pollution and reliance on fossil fuels in the district.
“Having declared a climate emergency in July 2019, initiatives like these are a key priority for us.”
And of the millions given by the government to KCC to facilitate walking and cycling, exactly what has happened?
The charging point in market street has been there from at least last year.Nobody knows it was there I asked for signage to make motorists aware that they can take there vehicles their agree it’s a start. Announcement from TDC a bit late.
All this is the biggest con beyond believe. The demand for electricity in years to come will be beyond our imagination
Then when we have storms in the winter times and we have power cuts nothing will move. Climate change is totally made up to make big companies a lot of money from stupid bill payers. I used to drive an electric milk float they often broke down despite being well maintained. Was I pleased to see a Diesel powered breakdown truck come to my rescue on a cold winters day.
I’m not going to ask you to provide evidence that “climate change is totally made up” because you won’t be able to present any.
It’s a shame TDC have no climate emergency change projects of their own. Their strategy is written on paper only and meaningless. Take the recycling mess for an example, then the trees in Thanet being felled all over for silly reasons with no interventions by TDC, no new TPO’s or anything. Their conservation areas have no real meaning either as no enforcement carried out on breaches taking place. Listed buildings being altered and demolished with no enforcement action either. TDC officers don’t seem to know how to run a local authority efficiently or properly. At least a start has been made by KCC with these charging points.
Until electric cars are affordable to everyone these charging points are for the benefit of very few people.
The charging point in Market Street car park was there before it was resurfaced.
It was a shame that they hadn’t put in the electric supply as they had to dig up the fresh tarmac to install it…
It’s a shame that so many people think that electric cars will be the saviours of the world.
They won’t.
There’s still a huge environmental cost associated with these sort of vehicles.
Yea so concerned with the environment that they got rid of their electric vans and replaced them with fiat diesel vans, and since then they have no interested in repairing the chargepoint in the mill lane carpark.
Great but this is a drop in the ocean. We need infrastructure for homes…there is a press release for one EV charging space in Margate!!! I don’t know what business TDC is running but mine wouldn’t run if we all have to queue for a go on one charger!!! More thought is needed for people living in normal houses with no driveways to charge overnight and rapid chargers at petrol stations and supermarkets. TDC and KCC really need to up their game and quickly.