4000 Miles!

I noticed last night on the way home from work that I have put 4000 all electric miles on the Saturn since its inaguaral commute back in March/April of '07. I thought I would share my observations after driving the car for the past 8 months. First off, I drive it just about every day. During the workweek I'm able to drive up to a Park and Ride that is 15 miles from my house and vanpool the remaining 35 miles up to work. You'd be surprised how rare of an occasion it is that I need to drive all of the way up there myself, since I've owned the car I think it has been less than 5 times. On those occassions I've taken a gas powered car and been stuck in traffic far too long!

It has been a long time since I last filled up a car with gas, in fact months. My wife drives our gas-powered car and usually fills it up every couple weeks. One thing we've noticed is that we need to fill up our gas-powered cars far less as well since we usually use the electric car on weekends for all of our errands around time. This morning (Saturday) we took it the zoo, and then over to get some lunch in downtown Tacoma and put about 20 gas-free miles on it. It is incredible how quickly those miles add up.

Overall, I really have enjoyed the car. It is reliable, fun to drive, and fun to show off when people realize there really is no gas engine inside. I think the main downside is that my battery pack range is right at the edge of my 30 mile commute, especially as it starts getting colder. This means that I usually take it pretty slow to conserve electricity and make sure I can make it the full commute. Other than that, no complaints for the first 4000 miles, just a happy electric car driver.