I am after information relating to electric charge point access for disabled/motability drivers.
Q1. How many electric vehicle public charging outlets or chargepoints have you installed in your local authority to date that are classed as on-street residential chargepoints, located in residential streets or areas? Please provide figures to the nearest possible date and include the month and the year the figures correspond to.
Devon County Council have been delivering electric vehicle chargepoints in car parks through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) part funded “DELETTI” project. The project has awarded contracts for chargepoints at approximately 100 car parks across Devon, Torbay, and South Somerset. 65 of the car parks are in Devon (excluding Torbay), typically installing a single dual socket chargepoint per site. Approximately 25 of these will be “rapid” chargepoints and the remainder, 22kw “fast” chargepoints. “Passive provision” in the form of the grid connection has also been installed to allow the suppliers to increase the number of chargepoints at each site if there is sufficient demand. Contracts were awarded in 2021/22 and sites started to be installed in 2022/23 and will continue to 2023/24. The number of sites delivered is below.
Financial Year 2022/2023: 22 chargepoints
Financial Year 2023/2024 forecast: 43 chargepoints
While we do not have an exact number as this has not been calculated, the majority of these car park sites meet the Government’s, “On-Street Residential Chargepoint Scheme” definition of “on-street” chargers as they are within a short walk of residents reliant on on-street chargepoints.
The private sector led and funded “Rapid Charging Devon” project is also installing chargepoints across Devon on-street and in car parks. Delivery is ongoing with around 10-15 on-street currently live and more to follow this financial year.
Q2. How many on-street residential charging outlets or chargepoints have you installed to date in your local authority that have been adapted specifically for disabled users? Please provide figures to the nearest possible date and include the month and year the figures correspond to.
No chargepoints are exclusively available for people with disabilities. However, Devon County Council have been actively engaged in discussions about accessible charging at a national level, and have sought to make chargepoints as accessible as possible. The current chargepoint agreements were entered into before BSI PAS 1899 was launched. However, the specification for the chargepoints required that accessibility was taken into account. For the DELETTI chargepoint sites we have been converting 3 standard parking spaces into 2 Electric Vehicle parking spaces, to provide extra space around the vehicle. For on-street chargepoints we reviewed national best practice at the time and also engaged with disability groups to try to ensure the chargepoints were accessible as possible. We recognise there is still work to do in this area and will be following central government guidance on specifying accessible chargepoints, including adherence to BSI PAS 1899 where appropriate.
Q3. How many on-street public charging outlets or chargepoints are positioned in disabled parking bays?
None. This may reduce the availability of disabled parking for other users and we have sought to make Electric Vehicle bays as accessible as possible for all users. This may also make chargepoint installations commercially unviable for operators if demand is too low.
Q4. How many of the on-street residential chargepoints in your area adapted for disabled users conform to the BSI’s latest accessible charging specification (PAS 1899:2022)? Please provide figures to the nearest possible date and include the month and year the figures correspond to.
This has not been assessed in detail because BSI PAS 1899 was released after the current agreements were entered into.
Q5. Does your electric vehicle charging infrastructure strategy include specific considerations for elderly and / or disabled users?
This is covered in recommendation 10 of the strategy below. Our overall approach to prioritise Electric Vehicle charging gullies and chargepoints in car parks over on-street chargepoints will also help to reduce street clutter and maintain footway widths for all users.
- “Ensure EV design considers diverse user needs as EVCPs are introduced, Devon County Council will need to understand the different types of users and non-users of EVs, to ensure the design and delivery approach used does not negatively impact some groups of residents or visitors, such as businesses or those with accessibility needs. Devon County Council will focus on ensuring that charge points can be accessed by all, and use government accessibility guidance. Concessionary contracts should include assurances to offer residents seamless access to charging services. This should mean a single or limited number of online platforms and apps to access charging services, as well as well-maintained and accessible devices, offering common charging technologies. In particular, lessons learnt from Rapid Charging Devon have highlighted the need to maintain a minimum distance around EVCPs to create more space for pedestrians and to ensure that EVCPs are located on build outs where appropriate. EVCP cable management must also be considered.”
Q6. Do you provide any additional support for disabled or elderly users wanting to access public chargepoints for electric or plug-in hybrid vehicles, such as charge-point assistants or roaming charging services?
No. Other organisations such as Motability can support people with disabilities access electric vehicles.
Q7. Do you support or provide marketing tools to residents to make finding charge point services easier, such as charge point booking or journey planning technologies?
No. Charge point booking can be offered by chargepoint operators, but has not been a requirement of chargepoints delivered or enabled by Devon County Council to date. Journey planning and chargepoint mapping and availability is offered by private sector companies including ZapMap, Google, Bing etc.