Fresh pictures from the site.
The good news: Construction is pretty much done.
The bad news: The site is not expected to open for another 3 weeks.
I talked to the contractor working on the site. He's staying at the hotel right there and saw me taking pictures. He came over to ask (nicely) that I not post any pictures that would make the site look bad and get him in trouble with Tesla. I don't think he had anything to worry about since the site is very clean, but in any case it led to an interesting conversation.
About the contractor:
He declined to identify himself or his company, but he's worked on about 45 sites for Tesla, not only superchargers but service centers and the battery swap station at Harris Ranch. He apparently travels over a wide area to work on these sites. Next up for him was finishing up a service center in California (I forgot where he said it was).
In some cases he is allowed to put in the transformer at a supercharger site, but not for Beatty. There the utility has to do it.
He said Tesla used to be a bit more easygoing, but now they're really strict in overseeing the sites. If they see pictures posted online that show the contractor has done some damage to nearby structures, or there's trash lying around, they will make life unpleasant for the contractor. Like I said, the Beatty site looks pretty clean.
About the Beatty supercharger:
Construction will be finished within a day or two. There are still a couple of light poles and some signs to put up, but it's mostly done.
The pavement was freshly painted. In the picture you can see boards still lying near the stripes. For some reason, the 2 stalls on the far end are spaced a little apart from the others, which makes for an odd set of stripes. I guess those are the handicapped supercharger spots?
There are 4 "vehicle charging only" signs up like the one in the picture. He said that all 8 spots are supposed to be exclusive, not the common 4/4 arrangement where half the spots allow public parking for a limited time. However, he only has the usual set of signs (4/4). If he doesn't get the shipment of signs that he's waiting for on Saturday, then he's going to put up the other 4 signs he has on hand because they have to move on. Can't really blame him, but given the ICE potential in this location it might be nice to have the exclusive signs.
He said the site is expected to be open in 3 weeks (he was pretty specific about it), but that could change depending on when the utility gets around to it and Tesla does their testing.
About Tonopah:
I asked him if he was going to work on the Tonopah supercharger and it seemed like he hadn't even heard of it, so clearly that's not in his immediate future. Not too surprising I guess since it hasn't been permitted yet.
About Truckee:
I think he said he worked on both of the superchargers there. The old one is apparently in a bad location with undesirable people hanging around (according to him; I haven't been there). The new one is in a better spot. The old one will be shut down at some point.
He had some interesting things to say about the battery swap station in California, but it's probably better not to post them.
I mentioned that there are still over 80 superchargers to go on Tesla's 2015 map, and his comment was that "they'll probably make it." I'm not sure that was based on any real knowledge though. It's pretty much hopeless at this point. 10 new superchargers a week in the US alone? I don't think so.
