The roads are quietly evolving

Year by year, electric vehicle adoption inches higher. Gasoline isn’t going to be around forever, and even while it lasts, increasingly, it’s less viable. Electric vehicle technology is improving much faster than the much better established internal combustion model, and with each passing year, the “which should I get” leans more in favor of electric.

Having joined the EV side of the fence, I can’t picture going back. EVs are the future. Maybe they’re not ion powered personal flight systems with orbital capability, but they’re our future, the future we can see in front of us and touch and, more importantly, drive today.

I’ll take a look at two sides of the divide, the practical and the vibes.

As far as practicality, it’s quicker to “charge” a gas-powered vehicle. It’s an errand, but a quick one. You stop at a pump, you handle an explosive carcinogen without safety gear, and you drive off a few minutes later. For an EV, it’s a slower process; even the fastest fast-charging takes 2-4x as long as gasoline. But it’s also passive, and many people can do it at home and overnight, skipping the errand phase entirely.

There’s also performance. EVs have torque. They accelerate quickly, easily, noiselessly. I’ve caught myself hearing a roar from an internal-combustion vehicle as it accelerates and thinking “wow, good for him, he’s trying so hard.” From a purely physics standpoint, all the noise and heat and exhaust coming out of a gas-powered vehicle is wasted energy.

Now, as far as the vibes. EVs are chill. There’s nothing from the old soundboard of car noises. No vroom. No starter motor cranking. No hum of RPMs that changes note with the shifting of gears. You push a button, and it’s on. Press down on a pedal and it goes. They had to install noises to keep them from sneaking up on pedestrians (especially those with vision challenges), and they went with a suite of woom-woom sci-fi noises depending on the manufacturer.

Not that everything is perfect. The cars are WAY ahead of the ecosystem supporting them. If you don’t charge at home, finding a charging station isn’t always trivial. Payment methods aren’t standardized, nor are charging speeds (most of which need to be a lot better for destinations where you might not want to wait hours for a slow charger). Then again, there are no oil changes, either. You don’t need transmission fluid since there are no transmissions. And brake pads hardly see any wear since they’re really only for complete stops.

EVs are simply a better technology. Gasoline would have gone by the wayside decades ago if not for a lag in developing dense enough battery storage. And as battery technology gets better and better, the case for injecting 20 gallons of explosives into your vehicle as a matter of course becomes less and less viable.

This is one case where living in the future involves cutting ties with a nostalgic past.