At a meeting earlier this week, the Ocean City, Maryland Mayor and City Council agreed to install electric vehicle charging stations in at least three locations. The Holiday Inn Oceanfront has already installed Tesla destination charging stations and those are up and running now.
In August, the Mayor and Council had agreed to accept a grant from Tesla Motors to install three charging stations in the Convention Center south parking lot. City Engineer Terry McGean reported that the originally proposed location in the southeast corner of the lot did not have electric service of the proper voltage for the charging stations and there was no close by transformer for DelMarVa Power to tap into. McGean recommended changing the location to the north side of the same parking lot near a utility pole with transformers to install the two Tesla HPWCs and one universal J-1772 station.
The City has also been approached by Electric Vehicle Institute (EVI), a Baltimore company that markets charging stations, with a grant that would include a generous number of charging stations including installation at no cost to the City. Ocean City would provide the parking spaces and electricity in the arrangement. After some discussion, the Mayor and Council voted to agree to the new location of the Tesla supplied stations at the Convention Center and to accept the EVI grant proposal for two stations each at Northside Park and the parking lot at 100th Street with another yet to be determined location in the south part of town.
City Engineer McGean was asked by the Council to explore options for the fourth EV charging location in the downtown area close to the boardwalk. Councilman Tony DeLuca said, “The more locations that we can have, the better. Having people come here with electric cars of all types is really the future and I just think it is the right direction.”
The City will provide the electricity for free for one year and then reevaluate. Councilman Wayne Hartman noted the @TeslaRoadTrip event that came to Ocean City in April and said that most of them stayed in Salisbury because of the chargers there. “If we have those 80 or 100 cars here, the town is going to actually make money by having those chargers here.”
The City Engineer has said that their goal is to have the Tesla charging stations installed by next spring.
