The road trip may be the perfect expression of American’s obsession with freedom. The ability to hop in a car and go wherever we want whenever we want has inspired a canon’s worth of books and films. It is the stuff of dreams, and very often of vacations.
This ideal would seem to be undone by our growing embrace of electric vehicles. Cars with cords offer many great benefits. They don’t burn gasoline or spew carbon dioxide. They've got tons of torque and terrific acceleration. But their one weakness, and it's a biggie, is range. You can only pack so much power into a battery, and when it's gone, it takes hours to replace. EVs can take you around the city, but not far from it. That's a bit of a problem, because although the average American commute is 24.18 miles round trip, 89 percent of Americans take at least one long-distance trip by car each year. And EV's can't play that most American of automotive roles, the road tripper.
Or can they?
Tesla Motors points the way toward our wide-ranging, freewheeling electric future with the Model S. The gorgeous battery-electric sedan is comfortable, quick and, price aside, supremely practical. Best of all, its huge battery pack lets you go as far as 265 miles. To fully liberate the S from the commuter car role most EVs play, Tesla is building a vast network of "Supercharger" stations that can get you going in 30 minutes.
So when I got a chance to skip town for a weekend in Los Angeles, I decided to do so in a Model S. I knew such a trip was possible---this is Tesla's home turf, and you can't swing an extension cord without hitting a Supercharger station around here. But you don't have to live in EV-lovin' California to make such a trip. EV pioneers nationwide have crossed the country and logged thousands of miles on epic road trips. One guy even rode coast-to-coast on an electric motorcycle.
Clearly such a trip is possible. Whether it's practical is another question entirely.
I was a few miles south of Santa Barbara, headed home on Highway 101 with the Pacific on my left and Los Padres National Forest on my right, when the answer came to me. Yes, a road trip in an electric vehicle is totally feasible, as long as you’re willing to make a few sacrifices. In four days, I covered 1,019 miles. I stopped to charge the car six times. And I learned that, with a little patience and planning, you can go as far you care to in an electric vehicle.
I love a long road trip. Through college, my friends and I would flee the Minnesota tundra each March for a week on the Georgia coast. It was a marathon drive, and we'd stop every four hours to get gas, grab a snack and use the restroom. We'd also stop for a proper breakfast at a Crackle Barrel to mark our arrival in the South. It’s a solid 21 hours of driving, and we'd make the trip in 25. It was mildly torturous, but the fastest way to get our pale, pale selves to the beach.
Still, the drive was almost as much fun as our week in the Peach State. Even now, I still consider pulling over with anything but a bone-dry gas tank and distended bladder a sign of weakness. So the idea that my joyride through the Golden State would require a 30-minute pit stop every three hours didn’t strike me as especially awesome or practical.
Turns out, I was able to put that time to good use. I caught up on my reading.
The Model S is a hoot to drive. Hit the accelerator and the car pulls forward with authority. Freeway on-ramps become one hell of a lot of fun. And it's all-day comfortable. Tesla's built a great road trip machine.
It isn't perfect. I find it distracting to have a 17-inch touchscreen display in my peripheral vision at all times, especially since that's how you control just about everything in the car (though basic things like changing the radio volume can be done via buttons on the steering wheel). The car also lacks features like adaptive cruise control typically found in cars approaching six figures. And the interior, though beautifully styled and richly appointed, lacks the utility needed for a long haul. There are just two cup holders (in a five passenger car) and not nearly enough cubbies and bins for things like phones, wallets and all the stuff young kids travel with.
Turns out finding someplace to stash your iPad is trickier than finding someplace to charge the battery. Yes, if you live in the middle of nowhere or want to explore, say, the Badlands or Bryce Canyon, you are indeed out of luck. But it's not the hassle you think it is. Tesla is rolling out a network of Superchargers that it claims will put 98 percent of the country's population within range of station by the end of next year. It's already got 98 stations nationwide right now, most of them along the coasts and meandering along the primary northern and southern cross-country routes. The Model S has an excellent navigation system that makes them easy to find. I made my way up and down the coast by typing "Supercharger" into the search bar and using each station as a waypoint. They're located near restaurants and other amenities, and the idea is you'll plug in, stretch your legs, grab a bite and maybe chat with fellow EV'ers.
“I’ve found a camaraderie among the owners I’ve met at the Supercharger stations,” says Terry Finan, who lives in New Jersey and has driven his S as far as Cape Cod, Mass.; Washington, D.C.; and Montreal.
The downside to this growing infrastructure is it's available only to Tesla owners, whose cars use a proprietary plug. For the rest of us, there is a growing network of public charging stations. We've already got more than 8,300 public charging stations nationwide (more than 20,000 outlets in all) and more on the way. Many campgrounds let EV drivers use the 50-amp, 240-volt hookups set aside for RVs. And if all else fails, you can always plug into a 110 outlet somewhere. It'll take hours, but it'll get you going.
My plan was to take Highway 101 out of San Francisco to San Jose, then swing over Highway 152 to Interstate 5 for the long haul to L.A. I figured I'd make two Supercharger stops along the way so I'd have plenty of juice to explore L.A. without needing to top off before heading home. For the return leg, I’d take Highway 1 up the coast or Highway 101, taking my time to enjoy the scenic route and charge as needed. I expected to cover around 800 miles and charge up five times, four if I got lucky.
I set off on a Friday afternoon with 256 miles of range and headed for a Supercharger station in Coalinga, 182 miles away. Range anxiety set in immediately. Every one of the 168,000 gas stations that dot our vast country were completely useless to me. I continuously calculated what I call the buffer zone: The difference between how far the car can go and how far I needed to go. I quickly learned that number shrinks significantly when you’re in traffic (lots of stopping and starting means lots of wasteful acceleration), driving especially fast (80 mph and up), or running the A/C on high.
On the first hour of my drive, I hit mild traffic and watched my buffer zone start to slip away. Panic set in. I pictured myself sitting on the side of the road in a dead Tesla, waiting for a tow. But once the road cleared up south of San Jose, the rated range---prominently displayed in the middle of the speedometer---started correlating with the distance I planned to cover and my buffer stabilized. I relaxed and began to enjoy the drive.
Anxiety hit a few more times over the weekend. The worst moment came on the road leading from Highway 1 to the Supercharger station in Atascadero, about midway to San Francisco. As I wound my way uphill, I watched my battery life fall away faster than America's World Cup hopes. Hauling a 4,600-pound sedan uphill takes a lot of electricity, even with a light touch on the go pedal. Sweating---because I was nervous, and because I'd long since turned off the energy-sucking A/C---I arrived with a mere 13 miles of range, far less than what I had anticipated. I'd made it, but it'd nearly given me an aneurysm. It was the low point of my weekend.
The lesson there is electric road tripping requires carefully managed expectations and a few sacrifices. You may set off with a 50 mile gap between your destination and the car’s projected range, but driving at 80 mph, blasting the air conditioner, or going uphill will eat away at that buffer. You have to carefully map your route beforehand and not deviate too much, which means you may not be able to take that side trip to see the world's largest ball of string (FWIW, I've seen it, and it's not worth the gas or electricity). I scrapped my original idea of driving back on Highway 1 because all the closest Supercharger stations are along 101 and 5.
“You do need to do a bit of planning before taking a road trip,” says John Sergeant, a Model S owner in New Jersey who has driven as far as North Carolina and Kentucky. He used Superchargers for part of that drive, and found other spots—including a Cracker Barrel restaurant in Tennessee—to charge up along the way.
Finan, who upgraded from a BMW 535i to a Model S, says he develops a “flight plan” for long drives, identifying charging locations and tracking his charging times, distance and energy use. He had no trouble making a haul from Montreal to New Jersey, though it required going just 62 mph and keeping the heat off even though it was 47 degrees out. Charlie Changchien, another New Jerseyean, has driven to Alabama and back, making the 2,200-mile trip in an S with the smaller 60 kilowatt-hour pack and a range of "just" 208 miles.
Of course, these guys are early adopters, the true believers willing to make sacrifices. For most of us, driving without heat (or A/C) is a non-starter. It just ain't gonna happen. But life with an EV doesn't have to be that rough.
On my trip, I drove 1,019 electric miles and stopped to charge six times. (Poor math skills, last-minute itinerary changes and two friends’ insistence on being chauffeured in the S required one more charging session than planned.) No, I couldn’t follow the exact route I wanted. Yes, stopping every three hours was a bit annoying. And I arrived in LA and back home in San Francisco a couple of hours later than planned.
But despite all of that, I got where I was going, and I had fun. Better planning would have made thing go more smoothly, but that's usually the case with any road trip. Nothing goes according to plan. The added time on the road let me see more of the countryside, and the frequent stops kept me rested and relaxed. I even caught up on some reading. All in all, it was relaxing and fun.
In other words, it was a perfect road trip.
