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How do you drive a Roadster in California?

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widodh

Model S 100D and Y LR
Moderator
Jan 23, 2011
6,861
2,840
Venlo, NL
I'm currently in California (LA / Santa Barbara area) for a business/vacation trip and one of the things I noticed is how horrible the roads are compared to our dutch roads.

They are full of holes and bumps :)

Anyway, it came to mind that a lot of Roadsters are driving around here in CA, makes me wonder: How does that drive?

The Roadster is pretty stiff, so going over the CA roads must be quit intense, isn't it?

Around LA I also noticed some signs "Electric vehicle charging station, next exit", tried to follow one (was at the I-10 in LA), never found the station....

So, how do you drive a Roadster in LA?
 
Hey now, that's just one of the benefits of having the second highest taxes in the USA!

But seriously, dodging potholes makes my drives into work more interesting - helps keep those reflexes sharp. :p On the other hand, what I would consider "fun" roads (scenic, curvy roads) are in very good shape. It's the Interstates with so much traffic, trucks, etc that are in such poor shape. The government can never shut down an entire road to repair it properly (the traffic mess would be insane) so they just do endless patching jobs closing one lane at a time.

As for the charging station thing, I have never seen those signs up here in Northern California. We just use smartphones with charging station location apps to find chargers.
 
Heck, I keep a mental map of places to not drive, and on certain roads specific potholes (like that one turning from Charleston onto Shoreline - do NOT hit that one in your Roadster). Yes, the roadways in America are suffering from significant neglect - our road-use related taxes don't nearly cover the upstream oil subsidies and are regularly poached for the general tax pool.
 
There are many of those signs left over from the EV1 days. Chargers are still being ripped out as others are being updated.

EVchargermaps is the best resource but it's far from perfect either.