Electric cars prove ideally suited for Detroit taxi service ... in 1915
The New York Times has taken a look at the suitability of electric vehicles for use as Detroit taxis compared to gas and "other" vehicles. Needless to say, the Times found the EV to be a very good option for the low speed urban duty cycle typical of a modern cab. Compared to gas powered cabs, pulling juice off the grid was very cheap making for low operating costs which are critical to cab profitability. The maintenance costs are also lower, due to the relative mechanical simplicity. Passengers also preferred the electrics for their smooth acceleration and low noise compared to gas cabs. Passengers were surprised to learn they were in electric vehicles, expecting them to be much slower.
When this particular article was published, there were already more than 600 electric taxis running in Berlin, Germany (compared to 1,600 gas versions). The biggest American operator of electric cabs, according to the report, is Detroit Taxicab and Transfer company. The company even installed chargers at cab-stands to keep the cars ready to go. According to the Times, the electric may not be able to compete with gas cars in all applications but for urban cab service, EVs definitely work. The article was published in 1915.
[Source: New York Times]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
jpm100 12:06PM (2/13/2009)
Those never went away. They evolved into golfcarts.
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Stan Wellaway 6:30PM (2/13/2009)
Having read the original article (the recent reprint of it I mean!), I see the cabs offered a range of 100 miles per charge. And that was nearly a century ago!
Mind you, electric cars did also outsell gasoline cars for a quarter of a century.
What goes around comes around eh. We are not so much at the start of the EV era, but merely continuing where we left off, now that those upstart gasoline things have had their day.
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Matt Groom 2:19PM (2/14/2009)
This is a point I've been making to people since, ohh... about 1995. Electric cars are not a good idea because they are grid-dependent. As the power grids of our nation's infastructure become more and more taxed, the cost of electricity will continure to go up and up unitl it is as expensive as Gasoline. The cars are better for the environment, until their batteries die and need to be disposed of, that is. There's also a lot of mining for battery material that has to be considered as environmental costs. You can expect maybe 10 years of life out of a quality electric car with current battery technology, which is pathetic compared to a conventional car that is properly maintained. Electrics have a limited range and long refueling times (compared to cars that burn fuel.).
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Tormod Henne 4:57PM (2/15/2009)
1) The cars are better for the environment, until their batteries die and need to be disposed of, that is... //When batteries die, they don't get disposed of. They get recycled. A gallon of gas on the other hand..
2) There's also a lot of mining for battery material that has to be considered as environmental costs... //There is a lot of "mining" to get crude too. An that will be worse with oil shale and tar sands.
3) You can expect maybe 10 years of life out of a quality electric car with current battery technology... //You don't thrash the car when the battery dies. You get a new battery that has a 10 year newer technology.
Matt Groom 10:26PM (2/15/2009)
Battery Material does not recycle well. What do you think they do with the lead in most car batteries today? They certainly don't melt it down and make new batteries out of it, since it no longer counts as a metal (more of a fulminate) and it's easier and cheaper to simply get more lead than to try to reuse the lead in old batteries. The simply dispose of it in a safe way.
Yes, the mining that is required to pull milions of tons of metals like nickel out of the earth to make batteries WILL certainly have a bigger environmental impact than sucking oil out of the rocks and sand. Believe it.
Nobody is going to spend 1/3 of a cars original value on batteries. Do you buy used cars when you know you need to replace the engine or transmission? Of course not, unless the car is unbelieveably cheap or incredibly desirable to you for some sentimental reason, you'll find either a cheaper car, or one who's batteries aren't dead.
I don't know why some people think electric cars have ANY future at all. This is not a new idea, this is not a new technology, this is not something we know nothing about it's potential. This is a thourougly tread path and it has NEVER proven to be cheaper or more practical than ANY other competition that it has yet faced. Not Gasoline, not diesel, not Nitromethane, not CNG, not Biodiesel, not Methanol, not Hydrogen, not anything.
It hasn't beaten out the most obscure and difficult to acquire fuel to be even the most probable second choice for solving our future transportaion needs, and it most likely NEVER will. Absurd ideas like compressed air viehicles probably have a brighter future than pure electric cars do. Yeah, I think the Tesla is cool too, but I like a lot of exotics that I recognize will never be practical or affordable no matter how cool I think they are. Many fans of electric cars simply refuse to acknowledge that fact.
Bill 8:35AM (2/19/2009)
"The typical new lead-acid battery contains 60 to 80 percent recycled lead and plastic."
http://www.batterycouncil.org/LeadAcidBatteries/BatteryRecycling/tabid/71/Default.aspx
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