"Tesla discontinued battery swap because people do prefer to spend 1/2 hour charging, even when traveling with sleeping children."
That was set up to fail.
There was only one battery swap station. It was aimed at people commuting between LA and SF. Except:
- you had to book in advance to use it
- you had to pay a fee to use it
- it was set up across the street from a Tesla Supercharger
- despite ostensibly being for the commute between those cities, it was actually 15 miles away from the freeway, making for a significant detour
If I was Elon Musk and wanted to demonstrate how people would much rather use charging stations than any kind of battery swap program, I think the above is a pretty good example of how I'd set up my battery swap program (for failure).
That was set up to fail.
There was only one battery swap station. It was aimed at people commuting between LA and SF. Except:
- you had to book in advance to use it
- you had to pay a fee to use it
- it was set up across the street from a Tesla Supercharger
- despite ostensibly being for the commute between those cities, it was actually 15 miles away from the freeway, making for a significant detour
If I was Elon Musk and wanted to demonstrate how people would much rather use charging stations than any kind of battery swap program, I think the above is a pretty good example of how I'd set up my battery swap program (for failure).