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Comment by DidYaWipe | Hacker News Reader

What went wrong is that the federal government didn't build or legislate a national charging infrastructure to match the scale of the interstate highway system.

They could have strong-armed the states into it with a combination of funding the construction and the way they mandated the 21 drinking age: by threatening to withhold highway funds.

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They definitely tried... $7.5 Billion worth. It's on pause now :-(

https://www.govtech.com/transportation/federal-funding-for-e...

To the other commenters replying to you, and to you as well, the money is committed in a way that is difficult if not impossible to prevent from going out the door once projects are complete or hit specific milestones. Many projects are already underway but it takes time to select sites, developers, manufacture chargers, negotiate with utilities, and develop the sites. This work is underway and many more chargers will come online over the next few years. The new administration is preventing new projects, but horses have already left the barn.

I certainly hope so. But this[1] (not to mention other highly illegal "impoundment" type actions of this administration) gives me little succor. :-(

[1] https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/nevi/resources/state-pl...

I don't think they actually tried. They created a fund... and then did nothing to implement the intended result.

And how many stations did that yield?

Isn't this lack of forward thinking somewhat the general problem now?

From an EU perspective the world as it has existed in the living memory is a world shaped by decisive US-actions. The way EVs have been approached were anything but that. Arguably neither did Germany, because of the way their politicians are entangled with the car manufacturers.

Germany actively hampered it by promoting diesel as THE greeen fuel.

Yes, as I hinted at in the last sentence of my comment.

> They could have strong-armed the states into it with a combination of funding the construction and the way they mandated the 21 drinking age: by threatening to withhold highway funds.

Yea let's give the federal government more power. That's going so well right now.

> Yea let's give the federal government more power. That's going so well right now.

Investing on a nation-wide infrastructure grid that fundamentally changes the nation's energy independence is hardly a reason to mindlessly parrot state rights cliches.

The current issue is the president ignoring legal limits of his power and breaking laws right and left. While his party cheers on.

While useful parts of the federal goverment are destroyed, because they dont serve ultra rich.

In a way, the current administration perfectly demonstrates the value of a strong federal government: a kakistocratic, kleptocratic regime wouldn't dismantle the "administrative state" if it weren't an impediment to their criminality, incompetence, and rapacity.

NATIONAL-scale projects are exactly what the federal government should do. I specifically referred to the Eisenhower interstate-highway system. Those are the kind of grand undertakings that transformed our country, and which the current administration can't even conceive... let alone articulate or propose.

Read about it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_Highway_System

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