Meanwhile, I rented a Model S from Turo (essentially Airbnb for cars) and had a great experience.
The car was clean, well maintained, fully charged and already parked in my hotel’s parking lot. Charging was free at any Tesla charger over the three days I had the car…I just had to plug it in and tell the car how much charge I wanted. When I was done with the car, I just had to snap a few photos and leave it in the same lot. And because the pickup/drop off point was at my hotel, I avoided paying for the car for the day I flew in and out since the hotel provided a shuttle to/from the airport.
It’s amazing that some guy named Marco who bought 6 used Teslas can do a more competent job of renting EVs than a multibillion dollar rental agency with huge economies of scale.
How to make electric cars fail; established entities can intentionally neglect and drag their feet, half ass implementation. Over time it fosters routine of negative experience, fostering a viral meme that ultimately squashes demand.
Incorrect. Hertz was the biggest corporate supporter of EVs other than the manufacturers themselves. Two different Hertz CEOs essentially bet their careers on an EV future. Your characterization of intentional neglect or feet dragging is absolutely not the case, they made big, bold Tesla purchases and aggressively deployed them in the field. The problem was that customers simply did not want to rent them.
Obviously technology since 1960-ish has made flights cheaper, but I don't really care about long term trends. I'm talking about now and into the future.
If you think the imposition of Net Zero, Carbon Taxes, energy transition etc etc is going to make flights cheaper I'd be interested to see how you think this will be achieved [1]
Still, as the saying goes "In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges". All the FAANG employees and VCs and other tech bros will be able to fly to the Caribbean and Europe. It will only really effect your average blue collar employee, and who cares about them, right?
Don't be ridiculous. Hertz is a for-profit corporation. They're not intentionally trying to lose money in order to sabotage EVs as some sort of grand conspiracy. They're just incompetent.
No, they just aren't as convenient yet. Who wants to rent an EV on a vacation and worry about where to charge it. Eventually they will be better in general but they aren't yet.
Maybe don't build a fleet of EVs if you're not equipped to at least charge them