Durham County Council will be implementing a small flat rate charge from Monday 23rd June to use council owned public charging points in the area.
The council, in conjunction with Charge Your Car (CYC), will be applying a £1 per visit charge on all their 31 charging points, with the exception of the rapid unit in Belmont Park and Ride which will operate on a £5 per visit tariff.
Electric vehicle (EV) drivers will be able to pay using their CYC Access Cards or, where available, the Charge Your Car app or pay-by-phone service.
The council says this will help pay for maintenance of the points. Moreover, by enforcing payment they believe drivers will be dissuaded from occupying charge point parking spaces if they have ample range remaining. This would serve to make the most popular charging sites more widely available.
Councillor Neil Foster, Cabinet member for economic regeneration, said: “The council is committed to encouraging the use of electric vehicles to help protect the environment of the county for years to come. We hope that the nominal fee will make it easier for drivers to access the most popular points as well as helping the council to meet some of the cost of maintenance”
This news follows up Zap-Map’s article revealing plans from the majority of public charging networks to switch to PAYG by the end of 2014/beginning of 2015. As the volume of EV drivers rises it will become more and more important to make sure charge points are maintained and available. It seems the only sustainable solution to this is the introduction of fees.
EV drivers need not worry as these charges are likely to remain small. Furthermore, even with networks starting to charge for their services, running costs of an EV are superior to a conventional vehicle by a significant margin. Find out more by reading our EV Buying Guide
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