Electric vehicle owners rely primarily on charging their vehicles at home on a daily basis. However, in some residential neighborhoods, residents do not have the ability to install a charger on their property in conformity with zoning, because there is no room for a garage and they have to park on the street, or the construction of a garage or parking area would be prohibitively expensive. A solution to this barrier to home charging would be to permit homeowners to install chargers at street curbs and to have exclusive access to parking beside those stations for nightly recharging of registered EVs.
The model ordinance allowing curbside charging is similar to, but differs significantly from, previously tested solutions. The model ordinance reserves the charger for the homeowner at night, but in most other respects it is modeled on one enacted by New Orleans in late 2017. The program that would be established under the ordinance would permit homeowners to install one charger adjacent to the public right-of-way in front of their residence if they do not have a garage or driveway, in residential districts, and to grant the residents exclusive access to the parking space adjacent to the charger from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. The space would be available for use by others during daytime hours. Given that the impact on parking is less than building a garage or driveway, this solution would be preferable even where the construction of a garage or driveway would be permitted by zoning laws. The permits would be limited to residents of single-family and two-family residences because they are likely to have sufficient street frontage to accommodate a charger and a reserved space for each unit.