Day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year:
I’m surprised the owner of this gas electric hybrid has managed to maintain this parking lifestyle for so long.
(If you tried this in Pac Heights, offended dog walkers would have DPT ticket you into submission, tout de suite.)
To wit:
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Of course this is just a Chevy Volt, which is a plug-in hybrid and not really an electric car.
I don’t see anybody else parking on the sidewalk like this…
First of all, the Chevy Volt hybrid car is a hybrid car. Yeah, I know it was going to be an electric car, but GM lied to us all, which is its right to, but a hybrid is a hybrid, right>
Second of all, sales of the the Chevy Volt hybrid car are abysmal, so that’s why you don’t see them causing a bunch of accidents, you know, the way the drivers of a hybrid car line from another manufacturer are famous for. I can’t recall seeing a crazy driving maneuver done in a Volt.
Third of all, Volt drivers park in the craziest places, as if they think they’re special.
Thusly:
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That’s the MO of one Volter, like every day.
The driver prolly thinks you are stupid for not parking in crosswalks yourself.
On It Goes…
“After a year’s success in casting bankrupt Fremont solar maker Solyndra as the prototype for President Obama’s energy policies, Republicans now are targeting what they have dubbed “Obamacars.”
OBAMACARS? THAT’S A NEW ONE ON ME. PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA INDEED HAS A PROBLEM ON HIS HANDS WITH THE VERY UNPOPULAR DETROIT BAILOUT. I’M NOT SAYING IT WAS HIS IDEA BUT HE CERTAINLY SUPPORTED IT AND IT WAS BAD IDEA, IMO. FOR SOME REASON, HAVING SOMETHING TO DO WITH OBAMA, GM MADE WILDLY UNREALISTIC FORECASTS FOR THE VOLT PLUG-IN HYBRID. OBVIOUSLY, THERE’S GOOD AND BAD FOR OBAMA TO BE SO INVOLVED WITH DETROIT.
For some GOP members of Congress, the Chevy Volt, made by General Motors, is a fire hazard and a job loser, while Palo Alto’s Tesla Motors is a crony capitalist purveyor of toy cars for Silicon Valley millionaires.
FIRE HAZARD? NO. JOB LOSER? NO. BUT CRONY CAPITALIST PURVEYOR OF TOY CARS FOR SILICON VALLEY MILLIONAIRES? YES! DING DING DING!
The campaign has tainted Energy Secretary and UC Berkeley physicist Steven Chu and his agency’s renewable energy loan programs, rupturing a consensus under former President George W. Bush, who started the programs to end America’s addiction to oil.
I DON’T KNOW IF THE CAMPAIGN DID THAT. WE’VE WASTED A LOT OF MONEY ON A LOT OF FEDERAL PROGRAMS – THIS IS TRUE WITH OR WITHOUT ANY CAMPAIGN.
But it may not stop the electric car. The assault has enraged General Motors. On March 1, the company opened an unprecedented campaign to re-introduce the Volt in California, the biggest U.S. auto market, even as it temporarily halted production because of slow sales.
THE CHEVY VOLT IS NOT AN “ELECTRIC CAR.” SORRY. IT’S A PLUG-IN HYBRID, IRL.
GM Chief Executive Officer Dan Akerson has complained about the political atmosphere that surrounds the Volt.
UH, DOESN’T HE OWE HIS JOB TO THE “POLITICAL ATMOSPHERE?” I THINK SO.
“Sometimes I feel bad for President Obama,” he said this month after an appearance at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco.
AWW. AND SOMETIMES SMITHERS FEELS BAD FOR MR. BURNS. SOMETIMES.
The automaker accused Republicans and the media of hyping claims that the car caught fire during testing, which forced temporary layoffs at the Volt plant in Detroit.
IF THE VOLT WERE WAAAAAY CHEAPER, IT WOULD SELL SOMEWHAT BETTER. THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH NEWS OF FIRES. GM, FOR POLITICAL REASONS, WAS WAAAAAAAY OFF ON PREDICTIONS OF SALES FOR THIS MODEL.
Tesla, which received a $465 million Department of Energy loan, has dropped pursuit of new federal loans, raised private cash and plans in July to start deliveries of its $50,000 S car, claiming it is on its way to the mass car market.
LOOK AT THAT S CAR GO! OR YOU COULD CALL IT THE TYPE S, AS TESLA DOES. AND HOW ABOUT $57,400 FOR THE BASE PRICE OF THE STRIPPER MODEL S, YOU KNOW, INSTEAD OF “$50,000?”
“We applied during the Bush administration, and we were approved under the Obama administration, so as far as we’re concerned, we at least had a bipartisan relationship for the loan,” said Tesla spokesman Ricardo Reyes. “We got one of first loans and we used it to build the car that is now going into production in a U.S.-based facility. … I’d like to think we’re pretty much a case study on what the loan program was designed to do.”
THE FEDS SHOULD NOT HAVE PUT ANY MONEY INTO TESLA. SORRY.
Showing photos of a charred Volt, a panel of the House Government Reform and Oversight Committee, chaired by Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Vista (San Diego County), held a hearing in January called “Volt Vehicle Fire: What Did NHTSA Know and When Did They Know It.”
NOW WE’RE INTO THE POLITICS. BUT I THINK ELEMENTS OF THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION PLAY THE EXACT SAME GAME, RIGHT?
“Without a doubt, the antics have hurt sales, which has probably contributed to the need to shut down the plant for a few weeks and temporarily lay off 1,300 employees,” said GM spokesman Shad Balch. “It’s just blatantly wrong information. You get some of these folks on national news shows making outrageous statements about batteries catching on fire and cars randomly exploding.”
THE “BLATANTLY WRONG INFORMATION” ABOUT THE VOLT MOSTLY COMES FROM GM. MOSTLY. THE VOLT IS AN UNPOPULAR CAR. DEAL WITH IT, GM. WHAT IF THERE WERE A HEARING SOMEWWHERE IN DC ABOUT EXPLODING APPLE IPADS? DO YOU ALL THINK THAT WOULD MAKE THE IPAD AN UNPOPULAR PRODUCT ALL OF A SUDDEN? THE EXPENSIVE VOLT IS THE EXPENSIVE VOLT. DEAL WITH IT.
An independent analyst at TrueCar.com, a new-vehicle pricing and research firm, said what is slowing Volt sales is GM’s failure to tout its economics as gasoline prices soar past $4 a gallon.
TRUECAR.COM IS A BIG POS OF A WEBSITE. WHY IS IT BEING CITED IN THIS FASHION?
The Energy Department’s loan programs have been plagued by politicization, bankruptcies and bureaucratic bungling.
OH, HEY. HEY, THAT SHOULD BE THE HEADLINE. NOW YOU’RE ON THE TROLLEY!
Electric car maker Fiskar Automotive of Anaheim, which produces the luxury Karma in Finland and is aiming to produce a mass market “Project Nina” car in the United States, was approved for a $529 million loan guarantee. But it has drawn down just $193 million and was blocked in May by the Energy Department from further disbursements for failure to meet project milestones. It has stopped work at its Delaware plant.
WHAT A FIASCO. WHY DO WE GIVE MONEY TO CARMAKERS?
Toprak of Truecar.com said the 18,000 electric cars sold in the United States last year, mostly the Volt and the Nissan Leaf, make up just one-tenth of 1 percent of new car sales.
TO REPEAT, THE VOLT IS NOT AN “ELECTRIC CAR.” REPETICION: EL CHEVY VOLT NO ES UN COCHE ELECTRICO. IT WAS GOING TO BE, BUT THEN THINGS CHANGED.
OH WELL>
What the Chevy Volt looked like back when it really was an electric car. As seen on Market Street in San Francisco back in 2008:
Later on they added in a gas engine and they made it look lame and then they jacked up the price waaaaaay high.
Oh well.
That’s GM for you…
During the time period that people from the disappointing Tesla Motors and CODA Automotive electric car “producers” were criticizing the design of the Nissan LEAF, Nissan simply worked hard to become the first mass-producer of electric cars.*
Of course, 6500 units over the past nine months might not sound like a whole bunch to you, but that’s more than what the vaunted Tesla,** CODA, and Solyndra*** have delivered altogether.
(The case from CODA against the LEAF can be found right here. Oh, and you can find Tesla fanboys celebrating the disruptive Northern Japan Earthquake and Tsunami right here.)
Presenting the Nissan LEAF. Adorable, huh?
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Heh, what a burn:
“6,500 no-gas Nissan LEAFs™ have now been delivered to excited owners. Across the country each day, new drivers are getting to enjoy the Nissan LEAF™. And as the first and only car manufacturer to mass-produce 100% electric cars, it’s clear that Nissan is 6,500 steps ahead of the pack.”
Ahead of the pack, baby.
You see, Nissan delivers while the others merely promise delivery. In CODA’s case the same basic car has been promised every year since 2007 and in Tesla’s I think it’s similarly been years since Tesla was supposed to have delivered the follow-up to that ridiculous Roadster, you know the car that got an airbag waiver from the feds cause Tesla said it would go out of business if it had to follow the rules that a manufacturer like, I don’t know, Nissan has to follow when it builds a car like, I don’t know, the LEAF.
Anyway, you’ll have to keep waiting for a Tesla Model S.
But don’t let me stop you from writing a check right now for $50k**** for a CODA Sedan, direct from China via Benicia.
Go for it, see if I care.
Oh hey, Nissan’s Drive Electric Tour is coming back soon. Sign up now, if you want:
San Francisco
11.18.2011 – 11.20.2011
11.25.2011 – 11.27.2011
Hurray!
*In the past century or so – somebody else might have been churning out BEVs back in the day. I don’t know how many old-school electric cars were mass-produced back in the late 1800s and early 1900s.
**You know how much kerosene Tesla Motors has bought for its globe-trotting CEO? My guess would be hundreds of thousands of dollars worth, by this point. Isn’t it ironic, don’tcha think?
*** Oh, I guess Solyndra didn’t even try to make cars. Oh well. Tell me, is there an issue with “ced[ing] the solar panel industry to China?” I mean, who cares if China builds solar panels?
****Including delivery and use tax, no negotiating! I think that you’ll have to pay normal purchase and registration fees for the CODA, but I’m not sure since I’ve heard that the state of CA waived these charges for some Tesla purchasers…
Remember this:
Everybody associated with electric car companies thinks it’s OK to lie to you. All of them.
OTOH, Nissan is not an electric car company, so not everything they say is spun into a lie. Isn’t that refreshing?
As here, where Nissan said it would deliver the LEAF last year and it did.*
(And, of course, the haterz at poorly-performing Tesla and CODA and others defunct and not-yet-defunct are still hating**)
It’s taken a while, all of 2011 so far to be exact, for me to see a LEAF in the wild and not as a part of a Nissan event.
See?
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Now, can I ask why Mayor Ed Lee has a gas-powered plug-in hybrid from Government Motors instead of an all-electric Nissan Leaf? (The answer might have something to do with the feds kicking in for half of the cost of Ed Lee’s Chevy Volt, and the power of the UAW, and the fact that people at City Hall thought it was an actual electric car. Oh well.)
Anyway, here’s your number one City runabout, garage definitely required.
*I think it was just five units delivered, which was less than Nissan thought it would do for 2010, but by the standards of the industry this is exemplary performance.
**It was a guy from CODA who said that “housewives” wouldn’t “feel comfortable” in the LEAF, you know, cause it’s so weird-looking, basically. He made this statement while inside a warmed-over electrified Mitsubishi (Carisma, aka CODA Sedan) straight outta 1996, ironically.
[UPDATE 2014: Upon further review, the Chevy Volt’s license plate has been grayed out. I had assumed that the Volt would be used as the previous vehicles, the Tahoes and Town Cars, had been used. But now I can see a possible security issue.]
Remember the former mayor’s Chevy Tahoe with an engine bigger than that found in the some San Francisco City buses? It was necessary for “safety,” or something.
Here it is, parked in a bike lane for an hour or two on a Golden Gate Park “Healthy Sunday.”
Anyway, that machine is long-gone now, so here’s the new ride for our new “interim” Mayor – it’s a Chevy Volt plug-in hybrid.
See? It was ordered a while ago. I think the Feds paid for about half of its $40k or so price.
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All right, let’s review. Despite what people at City Hall are saying…
“The Chevrolet Volt is Not an Electric Car – Repeticion: El Chevy Volt No Es Un Coche Electrico“
Let’s see here, even if you keep this rig charged up and topped off with juice all the time, it’s going to burn fuel from its gas tank, right?
“The Mountain Mode option gathers an energy reserve in the lithium-ion battery so that the car has the full power of both the gasoline engine and the electric powertrain behind it for, say, navigating a series of San Francisco inclines.”
Or I don’t know, just drain every last drop of gas from the tank and fill it up with sawdust and then see how far you and your Volt make it, I don’t care.
Or, just get a Nissan Leaf – that probably would have been the better move, considering the stated parameters.
Oh well.
Anyway, those are the differences between the old and new Mayors so far – not much else has changed.
As opposed to the local energy monopoly or the Marc Benioff, the best Bay Area Billionaire – they’ve had their Volts for a while now.
So, what do you think?
Better A (from back in 2008)?
Wow, it’s the new swoopy Chevy Volt electric car from GM, a private company!
Or, Better B (from right now in 2011)?
Oh, it’s the dumpy new Chevy Volt non-electric car from Government Motors:
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As always, You Make The Call.
[UPDATE: Well, I spoke too soon – Pigs, Giraffes, & Elephants just decided to foot the bill for their departing CEO. See below]
I don’t know, the problem with talking about “GM’s race to develop the electric Chevrolet Volt” is that the Chevrolet Volt isn’t an electric car.
It’s a plug-in hybrid, just like those familiar Toyota Priuseses you see being driven (badly) all over town.
So, calling the Volt “electric” is muy prohibidado, ‘specially for the writers at the New Yawk Times.
A PG&E exec motoring through the Inner Richmond to the glamorous West Bay suburbs of the 415 – let’s hope he won’t get $35 million of our money* when he screws something up/kills people and then quits/gets fired.
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(Garish decals removed, you’re welcome)
*”PG&E Shareholders to Pay Pension Benefits for Retiring CEO
SAN FRANCISCO, April 25, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — Earlier today, PG&E Corporation’s (NYSE: PCG) Board of Directors voted to amend the pension benefits for retiring Chairman, CEO and President Peter Darbee to provide that all pension benefits will be funded by the Corporation’s shareholders.
“With Mr. Darbee’s decision to retire, the Board is fully committed to taking steps that demonstrate the company is moving in a new direction,” said Lee Cox, the Board’s Lead Director. “Renewing public faith in PG&E is critical to our future. Today’s decision is another opportunity to show customers, regulators and others that PG&E is listening closely and taking action to earn back their confidence.”
The company announced last week that Darbee will retire effective April 30, 2011. Effective May 1, Cox will serve as interim Chairman, CEO and President of PG&E Corporation until a long-term successor to Darbee is onboard.
PG&E Corporation is a Fortune 200 energy-based holding company, headquartered in San Francisco. It is the parent company of Pacific Gas and Electric Company, California’s largest investor-owned utility. PG&E serves more than 15 million Californians throughout a 70,000 square-mile service area in northern and central California. For more information, visit the Web site at http://www.pgecorp.com.
Your Volt isn’t an electric car.
That’s why California won’t give Volt buyers a $5000 credit, more or less.
See how that works, GM?
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Now, if you took out the gas tank, then you’d have an electric car.
Oh well.