PORTLAND, Ore. — Electric-car drivers will get a charge out of a block-long stretch of a downtown Portland street that has been dubbed “Electric Avenue,” and it may also help the automotive industry and others make important decisions as the use of electric cars evolves.
Seven electric charging stations from six manufacturers have been installed at Portland State University as part of a two-year study that will examine which chargers get the most use, who’s plugging in and what drivers do while their cars drink up a charge.
The charging stations were unveiled Tuesday in a ceremony that, naturally, featured the 1980s Eddy Grant song “Electric Avenue.” Drivers who rock down to Electric Avenue can charge up for free, as long as they pay standard street-parking rates at the meter.
With electric vehicles just beginning to prowl American streets, researchers and industry officials hope the Portland project will fill in important blanks about how those vehicles are being used now and will be used in the future.
“The biggest unknown right now is driver behavior and all the factors that go into what a driver is willing to do,” said Shad Balch, a spokesman for General Motors, which is selling the all-electric Chevrolet Volt. “All of these things will help drive what we do next as far as creating a market for electric vehicles.”
Electric Avenue has one quick- charge station that can juice up an electric vehicle in about 30 minutes. The other six stations are called Level 2 chargers and can fill up most batteries in four to six hours.
