In message , at 12:06:22 on Wed,
11 Sep 2019, Theo remarked:
Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 10:38:07 on Wed,
11 Sep 2019, Theo remarked:
https://goo.gl/maps/ZVkwF8yevgVPVWwx5

Those garages aren't fit for purpose, because you couldn't fit a modern car
in them, and presumably the owners don't get anywhere else to put one.
They're essentially covered bike-and-junk shelters.

But we are where we are. And while those garages will be counted in the
stats being bandied about "40% have garages", I tend to agree they don't
in practice facilitate the charging of electric vehicles at all.

Those houses have no parking facility, for almost any kind of modern car.
The owners have to resort to parking their car on street, just like those in
Victoria terraces do. Their position is actually worse than a
Victorian-terrace-resident, since streets of terraces often have space for
much on-street parking.

This isn't a new phenomenon, Cambourne (which you can only realistically
access by car) restricted on-premises parking which simply resulted in
cares parked in silly places on the streets.

This is nothing to do with electric cars as such - these houses are not
designed for cars at all (even if they claim otherwise).

The claim we need to be interested in is that 40% of houses have
garages, and are therefore suitable for hosting chargers and electric
cars. The 40% figure ignores the fact that $foo% of those "garages" are
entirely unsuitable for that task.

Other developments at least admit that cars are parked outside these days:
https://goo.gl/maps/bpbaVTgDTCAJKpNA6
and charging here would be fine.

You wouldn't get much more than a Smart Car there, without obstructing
the pavement.

I think the Streetview car's lens is foreshortening the space, but you're
right it looks about 3-3.5m - supermini kind of size.

If you look at the boundary wall it's about 40 bricks on their side,
which is 13ft. That would make the paving slabs of which there are 6.5,
2ft each. A standard size. So 4.1m, which is enough for a Fiesta but not
a Focus. A Nissan Leaf is 4.5m

(although I don't know if there's a covenant about putting extra stuff on
the front of your house)

I've only seen covenants about satellite dishes, but if people invent
suitably ugly charging points, developers might catch on and start
banning them too.

More of the 'you can't stick anything on the front of your house and the
door has to be grey' kind of covenants.

I've seen door colour restrictions in conservation areas, but nothing as
generic as "anything on front".
--
Roland Perry