Electric car advocates plan public test drive day
Electric car advocates say one reason for the slow adoption of the vehicles is that not enough people have tried them out. They note that EVs are quiet and have a lot of zip at city speeds. In other words, the cars do better going from zero to 30 mph than they do from 30 to 60.
People can test drive the latest generation of electric cars at the Automobile Driving Museum near Los Angeles International Airport on Sept. 23. The event is organized by Plug In America, a nonprofit that advocates the use of rechargeable cars, and runs from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at 610 Lairport St., El Segundo.
It is part of the National Plug In Day celebration that is taking place in 60 U.S. cities.
Test models include the Nissan Leaf, Tesla Roadster, Chevrolet Volt, Coda, Mitsubishi iMiEV, BMW ActiveE, Honda Fit EV, Plug-In Prius, Toyota RAV4 EV and Fisker Karma. Bikers will get to try out the Zero and Vectrix motorcycles.
A limited number of Automobile Driving Museum historic cars will also be available for ride-n-drives.
One of the cooler vehicles on display for the rechargeable crowd is an early 20th century Milburn electric car that reportedly had a range of 75 miles on one charge, about the same as a modern Leaf and a Tesla Motors uber-luxury Model S EV.
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