By Sara Beth Williams–
Drivers visiting stores in the Birdcage shopping center might notice construction fencing and heavy construction equipment while navigating through the Best Buy parking lot.
Heavy equipment, fencing, and piles of dirt could be seen this week in the far corner of the parking lot at Best Buy. According to Sunrise MarketPlace Executive Director Kathilynn Carpenter a new set of Electric Vehicle charging stations are being constructed. No date of completion was immediately available.
The construction of more EV charging stations comes following the opening of a new set of EV charging stations across the street at the corner of Sunrise Boulevard and Macy Plaza Drive in the parking lot of the former Sears building. The charging stations, which were completed in the early summer, have already seen some use by drivers, despite the vacant buildings in the parking lot.
The state of California has passed multiple laws in relation to electric vehicles, including an effort to ban gas-powered cars by 2035 and several laws regarding EV charging infrastructure.
AB 1236, which passed in 2015, mandates that local governments streamline the permitting process for EV charging stations, requiring administrative approval for compliant installations and prohibiting unnecessary restrictions.
AB 970, passed in 2021, establishes strict timelines for local jurisdictions to approve or deny EV charging station applications. It also prohibits requiring replacement of parking spaces removed for charger installations.
Effective Jan. 1, 2023, a set of CALGreen building code updates require new residential and commercial buildings to include a certain percentage of infrastructure for EV charging.
About a quarter of all new cars registered in California in 2023 and in 2024 were electric cars, according to a Feb. 5 article from CalMatters. However, flat sales followed several years of rapid growth, and sales are still far below the state’s 35 percent target.
The California Energy Commission recently announced in March that the state now has 178,549 public and shared private electric vehicle chargers installed, which exceeds an estimated 120,000 standard gasoline nozzles statewide. The energy commission also said California has “doubled down” on EV infrastructure, approving a $1.4 billion investment plan to expand its charging and hydrogen network.
