Cardiff worst equipped major city for shift to electric vehicles, study finds
Cardiff is the worst equipped major city in the UK for the shift to electric vehicles, a study has found.
By analysing a range of factors including the cost of charging and availability of charging points, Saga ranked the best and worst electric-friendly UK cities.
Cardiff ranked bottom of the table out of 20 cities, due to a lack of public charging points and high cost of charging, showing improvement is needed in the city’s EV infrastructure.
Cardiff fell below both Stoke-on-Trent in 19th place and Southampton in 18th place who also scored poorly.
62% of those in Cardiff (and 60% across Wales) said their area was ill-equipped for EV charging. High cost to purchase (69%) and a lack of charging points (65%) were cited as reasons drivers in Wales would not switch to EVs.
Despite Cardiff’s low score for infrastructure, Saga found widespread enthusiasm towards EVs among drivers there.
62% of drivers in Cardiff (and 64% in Wales as a whole) would consider switching to an EV. Drivers in Wales cite the positive environmental impact (55%) and savings on fuel costs (53%) as the top reasons they would make the switch to electric
52% of drivers in Wales also thought that charging an EV is less expensive than filling up a petrol/diesel car – rising to 58% in Cardiff.
Martin Broom, Motor and Home Product Director at Saga, said that the number of drivers considering a switch was “encouraging” but that infrastructure was now key.
“It’s clear there’s a need to build awareness but most importantly to build and improve the UK’s public EV charging infrastructure,” he said.
Across the UK, Saga’s ranking found that Greater London was the most electric-friendly city, followed by Newcastle upon Tyne in second place.
Two Scottish cities ranked in the top five: Glasgow is the third best city for EVs, and Edinburgh follows behind in fifth place.
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I’m shocked Lee Waters…no, not really…
I beg to differ. They’re all pretty hopeless in the real world whatever the charts say
I contacted the council around 2/3 years ago (pre-covid) about the possibility of me paying to install an electric charging point at my house and what support (non-financial) I could receive from the council in regards to advice and parking spot (I live on a dead-end terraced street with resident parking). No word in response.
We’ve got a lot of empty, ugly high rise buildings for “students”. Why are we asking our Council to provide anything more for us?
Hm, based on the data shown in that table, I am at best skeptical of this “study”. Look at the “Clean Air Zone” scores; 12/20 cities score precisely zero, and those that did register a score were awarded 5, 7.5, 10, or zero. Now look at the column to the left, “Cost of Charging”; the average of the scores is roughly somewhere around 3, but suddenly for Belfast it’s whacked right up to 10 – why? And what “min-max normalisation formula” was used to determine the final rankings? There seems to be a bit of a disparity with the final… Read more »