progress on Green Cactus Highway between Tucson and Hermosillo, including Restaurant Elba in Santa Ana, Mexico

[Josh L]

Hi:

1. Restaurant Elba in Santa Ana (between Nogales and Hermosillo)
has been working for awhile now to provide EV charging and has
recently opened a Tesla and J1772 which can be seen pictured
here:

https://www.plugshare.com/location/193484
>Restaurant Elba
>J-1772, Tesla
>Calle 5 de Mayo, La Loma, 84600 Santa Ana, SON, México

http://www.restaurantelba.com

I believe there is a hotel or motel within a block or so, but I
am going by memory. It isn't clear to me if there might be some
ability to charge overnight and sleep at the hotel, or something
like that. Perhaps whoever has the honor of putting the first
review into plugshare.com can further clarify.

2. Taking a moment to tally things up from plugshare.com, on
the path between Hermosillo and Tucson (but not counting
stations in those end-point cities):

1. Tesla Supercharging: 0
2. CHAdeMO and CCS: 0
3. J-1772: 4 (1 in the US unrestricted, 3 at three different
restricted sites in Mexico)
4. Tesla L2: 2 (0 in US, 3 restricted in Mexico)
5. NEMA 14-50: 2 (2 in US (I think one is restricted, one is
not), 0 in Mexico)

Note that two of the sites in Mexico (Fiesta Inn in Nogales (1
J1772, 2 Tesla L2) and Elba Restaurant in Santa Ana (1 J1772, 1
Tesla)) have multiple stations.

fwiw, as to having a bit of fun trying to estimate whether
Mexico or the US is ahead, I'll say I think it's kind of close,
but in the last year, the Mexican side has considerably
improved, with three different restricted L2 site additions.
Maybe it's best just to say it's still early days, the big boy
networks are still neglecting us, long range BEV drivers still
have to be extra careful on this route, and short-range BEV
drivers should probably not attempt it unless they have done a
lot of planning and are prepared to try to overcome multiple
difficulties and spend what most would regard as an inordinate
amount of time on just a few hundred miles of travel.

It's also worth noting that it is about 1,500-2,000 feet uphill
from Tucson to Nogales, and this is another reason short-range
BEV drivers find it challenging. I don't know the altimeter
changes between Nogales and Hermosillo.

Josh

[Josh L]

One other key data point:

As to counting auto dealers between Hermosillo and Tucson which
are offering new EVs for sale or lease, there appear to be none
on the US side. This includes the Ford and Chevy dealerships in
Nogales and the Ford/Hyundai dealership in Green Valley. (Around
2012 I do think the Chevy Dealership in Nogales, USA did offer
Volts for sale, but perhaps at that time there was not
sufficient interest).

Recently on the Mexico side, Nissan Magdalena started offering
charging. I don't know with certainty if this means that they
are offering the vehicles, but maybe someone with Spanish
language skills can verify:

https://www.nissanmagdalena.com.mx/promociones-nissan-leaf-es-mx.htm

If they do offer BEV Leafs for sale or lease, this would be
another first for Mexico along this route, though I think the
Nogales, USA Chevy dealer sold the first PHEVs.

Yes, indeed, it is useful to note automakers which avoid the
dealership system altogether, and that means Tesla.

I did run into an owner of a (used) Tesla Model S in Rio Rico
the other day. It's just one vehicle, but adding this to a few
Volt sitings and a bit of other hearsay and I'll say we are
starting to see some movement on the question of increases in
the local population of EVs, whether the local old-timey dealers
are fully supportive or not.

Josh

[EV@TucsonEV]

Great!

Google shows 2h 40min, 140 miles to Elba from Tucson and then 1h 50min, 106 miles
to Hermosillo. Very doable in a Tesla... If the V/A at Elba is around 240/30, that
means about 25 miles/hour charge, or 4 hrs at Elba, a nice long leisurely meal...
A full day to Hermosillo

Hey Marco, fly to Tucson and we'll drive to Hermosillo!

Best regards,

Rush Dougherty
TucsonEV
1014 E King St
Tucson AZ 85719
520 240 7493
www.TucsonEV.com

Want 2000 miles free supercharging when
you buy your Tesla, use my Tesla referral
https://ts.la/rush40683

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[Ing. Marco Gaxiola]

Ahh unfortunately I already booked straight to Hermosillo This time. LoL

Josh, the elevation from Nogales to Santa Ana, Son. goes down, and Hermosillo is just 100mts (328ft over sea level) so going to HMO wouldn’t be that hard but the way back will do.

I’ll try to give them a call (Nissan Madgalena, Son) and ask them if they have the Leaf for sale.

Something to add is, in my experience driving an EV in Hermosillo; is that you can ask places like restaurants, motels or hotels (or any kind of business/home) for a 120vac outlet to get a chance to charge. I did that many times when driving around the city with my limited range EV-March. Especially when you show them that your car is not a ‘normal’ vehicle and give brief explanation of the EV, then you become more than welcome.

Some others, concerned of the cost of the electric bill; but when I told the how much energy-time my charge would cost them, then they said ‘ahh so it is way cheaper to drive an EV than ICE!’ Since electricity is way cheaper that gas.

Marco Gaxiola


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