The city of Gainesville announced Tuesday that it was awarded $11.65 million in grant funding through the federal Charging and Fueling Infrastructure (CFI) Program to build new electric vehicle (EV) charging stations.
According to the city press release, 47 new dual-port electric vehicle (EV) charging stations will be built throughout the area that will be capable of charging up to 94 EVs simultaneously. The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) announced the awards this month.
The 17 proposed sites for the charging stations on the federal grant application include the MLK, Jr. Multipurpose Center; Butler Plaza Transit Station; Sweetwater Wetlands Park; Depot Park; Gainesville City Hall; Eastside Community Center; Northside Park; SW Parking Garage and the Gainesville Technology Entrepreneurship Center.
Additional sites for new charging stations, in cooperation with community partners, Alachua County and Gainesville Regional Utilities, were the Alachua County Health Department; Alachua County Tax Collector Office/Florida Department of Motor Vehicles; Sweetwater Preserve; Veterans Memorial Park; Cynthia Moore Chestnut Park; Tower Road Branch Library; University Air Center and the Gainesville Regional Airport.
“As EVs move onto the secondary market, we are already seeing increased demand for them, and this helps make certain usage can be citywide,” said Gainesville Mayor Harvey Ward in the release. “There are going to be even more of them on the road than there are now, and that infrastructure for them is necessary. This is a very big deal,” he said.
There are currently 126 charging stations throughout Gainesville. According to the release, “stations in east Gainesville were proposed, in part, to reach underserved low- and moderate-income communities where private sector investment was unlikely, absent federal funding.”
Levels 2 and 3 chargers will help build out alternative fuel corridors – designated routes where drivers can easily find alternative fuel stations that provide options such as electric vehicle charging, hydrogen, natural gas or propane, instead of traditional fuels.
“The Biden administration has made historic investments to support the EV transition and make sure it’s made in America,” said U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg in the release. “These investments will help states and communities build out a network of EV chargers in the coming years so that one day, finding a charge on a road trip will be as easy as filling up at a gas station.”
Gainesville, which will secure a private contractor in the coming months for the project, will contribute $2.91 million and raise the total value of the project to $14.56 million. Later in 2025, the city will host community engagement sessions, and the design and site improvement work will happen in 2026 at each location. Installation of the charging stations should begin in late 2027.
In 2018, the Gainesville City Commission adopted a goal of net zero emissions by 2045.
“Transportation and energy generation remain the largest contributors of Gainesville’s carbon emissions,” said Gainesville Chief Resiliency Officer Dan Zhu in the release. “This project will play a critical role in reducing those emissions.”
There will be some who will think this is a waste of $ by taking the grant total and dividing by 48. It’s not just the stations themselves, but the additional base infrastructure that’ll then allow for growth and expansion.
Count me among them! It’s absolutely a waste if taxpayer money, and it’s going to benefit the wealthier class, who can afford these expensive, heavier electric vehicles that disproportionately contribute to the wear and tear on our neglected roads.
Every time I see one of those charging stations, I will think, “What else could have been done with A quarter million dollars of taxpayer money?”
These 47 charging stations will benefit a very, small number of local residents. Another parting gift by the Biden Regime, redistributing the taxpayers’ money to benefit their cronies and some naive people who have bought the “Green New Deal” lie…
Kathy B, can’t wait to tell my construction worker son, whose family car is a very small EV, that he’s part of the elite now. I didn’t know that elite types got up every day at 4 am, worked a physically demanding job all day and came home bone tired just to afford the smallest EV available so they could save money on gas and help the environment at the same time.
The Level 2 and Level 3 stations are FREE for the user. They get energy / electricity to operate from OUR utility for FREE while most of us pay for our gas . Privileged people sucking theteet of government once again.