John Merli—Recharging the driving future in Virginia

If Virginia in any way resembles a microcosm of the country (an arguable point, but we do have that internal “North and South” thing going for us), we also live in a world of increasing contradictions that
compete for our time, money and resources. And how we respond to these competing elements en masse will certainly say a lot about how we spend future decades here in Prince William and well
beyond its boundaries.

For example, is this not a contradiction? At the same time the Commonwealth decides to team up with the state’s largest electric utility, Dominion Virginia Power, to provide recharging stations for those
new hybrid vehicles at a handful of Rest Areas along some of our highways, we also shut down other Rest Areas altogether as a cost-cutting measure sanctioned by Gov. Tim Kaine and his compatriots
in Richmond

While the governor’s office this week said the state’s co-op venture with Virginia Power will not cost us state taxpayers a dime (and how many times have we heard that phrase?), it’s not the minimum
start-up or operating expenses that might have been involved that I wonder about. It’s why, if we’re really serious about trying alternative energy sources and keeping Virginia green (both literally and
figuratively), are we doing away with relatively inexpensive, already existing highway rest plazas that, if nothing else, could have been used as additional recharge zones down the road (so to speak)?

This scattering of recharge centers each can take up to four vehicles at a time (at 120 volts, although upgrading to 240 volts seems to be in the cards) and Virginia Power is teaming with VDOT to help
locate other potential recharging areas. The first of these 21st century outlets is already up and running on Interstate 64 at the westbound New Kent rest area.

At this point, some of you already may be thinking in the back of your mind, “Ah, hybrids are good, and yes, it will save oil. But how is Virginia Power powering its own recharge centers in the first place?
Surely it’s not also plugged into some other source for power? And so, yes, another largely unseen contradiction in this infant hybrid-recharge scenario could be that the electric juice flowing from that
convenient wall socket or recharge center of the near-future may be coming from (dare I say it?) coal-fired plants or some other “primitive” means of energy.

Still, greatly reducing gas fumes on Virginia roadways and simultaneously lessening dependence on foreign oil means that, given the choice between a gas-only and a hybrid vehicle, my next car almost
certainly will be the latter. Duh. And none of the hybrid owners I know seem to suffer from any form of “buyer’s remorse.”

Yet we’re confronted with other myriad contradictions routinely: We remove hybrids from the exemption list for using our HOV lanes without penalty, and we build HOT lanes on the Washington Beltway
so drivers with higher incomes have one more reason to not use public transportation for their daily commute. We keep the Metro rail system as far away from Prince William as possible, while extending
its reach north and west through Tyson’s to Dulles. A show of hands … how many of us would be taking the Metro to Dulles today, if it were already here? (I see three people with their hands up.)

I suppose one could argue that if we eventually wind up going the hybrid recharge route in a big way, sooner or later we’ll have plenty of potential vehicle recharge sites available — mostly from all those
ensuing shuttered gas stations. That, too, would be an ironic contradiction, and in many ways a welcomed one for our future.

John Merli has been a Prince William County resident since 1984, and a Potomac News columnist since 1985. E-mail him at .