Rain Puts Lamppost EV Chargepoints Out of Action

Units removed because they were knocking out street lights

Bays on Wavendon Avenue remain empty due to fear of fines

July 21, 2024

A number of electric vehicle (EV) chargepoints on lampposts across Chiswick have been decommissioned after they were affected by heavy rainfall.

EV owners were perplexed last week when charging equipment was removed from a number of sites including Wavendon Avenue and Netheravon Road without any prior warning or explanation.

Some residents had previously been reporting issues with the chargepoints which were installed by Ubitricity, an operation owned by Shell. The slow chargepoints (3-5kw) are fitted to lamp-columns and are meant to provide residents, without off road parking, a means to charge their vehicles. Recently the council put bays in place which made anyone parking in them liable to receive a penalty charge notice unless they were charging their vehicle. However, motorists had been informing local councillors that a number of the chargepoints were non-functional.

Chiswick Homefields councillor John Todd was told by an engineer working for the council that the units had been poorly fitted and required changing but no timescale was given for their restoration.

Chiswick Gunnersbury councillor, Joanna Biddolph was also receiving complaints about both the failure of streetlights and failing EV chargers on Wavendon Avenue which she raised with officers. In a reply sent to her by Hounslow Highways, it emerged that the two issues were connected.

She was told that the EV chargers had developed faults in the lighting column which Hounslow Highways believe may have been caused by the recent heavy rainfall. Water was getting into the devices which was causing them to trip and the power to be disconnected. This it turn caused the lighting columns to have faults and put them out of action. Hounslow Highways is not responsible for the maintenance of the EV charging units but tasked with keeping the street lighting working. Therefore, the EV chargepoints were disconnected to get the street lights working again.

As it is no longer possible to charge at these points, drivers are assuming that they will be fined if they use them and therefore no vehicles are being parked in them.

Another bay on Wavendon Avenue where the chargepoint has been removed

Cllr Biddolph said, “In a country which gets a lot of rain, this seems to fall into the ‘you couldn't make it up’ category. Installing these slow and unreliable EV chargers in lamp posts, at the same time blocking off so many residents’ and other parking bays for EV charging only, while apparently knowing that they are vulnerable to rain, seems to be another transport policy that hasn't been properly thought-through. Residents have told me that they avoid these lamp post charging points because they are so unreliable and the charging takes so long.

"Instead, they drive to charging points they can count on, as a discussion in the CW4 forum reveals. Hounslow Council should invest in reliable fast charging points to meet residents' and business owners' needs - and end its spiteful anti-parking and anti-car approach which is limiting residents' and business owners' lives and damaging Chiswick's retail, hospitality and service economy.”

Even CPZ permit holders with EVs are unwilling to use the bays