Who is going to work at Ford Motor Company’s parts warehouses if the United Auto Workers union goes on strike? If you are currently reading this post in an office in Dearborn on your Ford-issued laptop, which you secretly use to talk shit about Chevrolet in The Autopian’s comments, I have exciting news: you are!
Welcome to Friday, Autopians. The majority of the crew is still at Pebble Beach, sipping champagne and stuffing hors d’oeuvres into their blazer pockets while hearing about how the average Infiniti owner is on an upward arc.
I, however, am here and will deliver unto you the news. We have the latest on the UAW’s ongoing negotiations, plus some EV-related stories out of China and New York City. Let’s hit it.
Ford May Turn To White-Collar Employees To Make The Cars If The UAW Strikes
The UAW’s clearly not messing around when it comes to its various labor demands with the Big Three automakers. Those include wage increases, guarantees for jobs in the electric future and ending Great Recession-era concessions around pensions and more. One analyst we cited earlier this week put the strike odds at 50-50, but I think they’re higher than that.
If a strike happens, Ford’s got a plan to avoid the interruption of parts to car dealers, the Detroit Free Press reports: train up engineers and other white-collar salaried workers to fill in by driving forklifts and doing other tasks usually assigned to blue-collar workers.
Over the past month, Ford has held meetings with salaried workers, including engineers, to explain that the company wants to protect the flow of parts to car dealers in support of customers. This means Ford is planning to take actions that include sending white-collar workers into parts warehouses to run forklifts, according to meeting attendees.
If operations are disrupted and factory production is shut down, Ford is planning to deploy salaried workers to 20 sites in 15 states with Ford parts depots.
The automaker asked salaried workers to complete online surveys to rank their top three preferred sites in California, Oregon, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, New Jersey, North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and Wisconsin, based on an audio recording made by a person attending one of the meetings and additional documentation obtained by the Free Press.
“We are working hard to reach a new deal. But, like we do for any scenario where customer service could be interrupted, we need to plan for the possibility of a UAW strike. Our customers and dealers are counting on us to ship parts so we can keep Ford vehicles on the road,” a Ford manager said on the recording, who also told those in attendance that a script had been provided by labor affairs.
Parts shortages could be a particularly painful aspect of a strike, given how hard-hit that side of things has been hit by the pandemic. And the automakers need to stockpile parts if a strike goes on for a while. Ford didn’t want this tactic to become public knowledge because it’s not a great look:
Salaried workers who attended confidential meetings were told not to discuss the plans with any colleagues or family members. Ford told its employees that they would have to tell family and friends that they were traveling on business and not disclose any other detail.
“You’re sworn to secrecy,” salaried workers were told. “We’re aiming to keep you close to home,” the Ford manager told salaried workers. “You will still have the opportunity to identify your preference … in case you have the interest to travel elsewhere during this time. These preferences will be accommodated wherever possible.”
Clearly, that didn’t work, seeing as how it’s in the Detroit Free Press and all. As that story notes, two years ago a salaried worker filling in for a factory worker crashed a tractor during the John Deere strike, and that company also allegedly sought to bury accident reports from the time.
Maybe Ford’s employees don’t want to cross a picket line; maybe they just don’t want to be sent to a parts warehouse in Florida, or something. But this was clearly not a popular move with everyone.
Meanwhile, according to the Detroit News, the newly militant UAW under President Shawn Fain has a vastly more direct tactic than we’ve seen before: publicly calling out elected officials, including typical allies like President Joe Biden, to muster support instead of working behind the scenes. Emphasis mine below:
Fain has held multiple meetings on Capitol Hill to rally support from lawmakers, even as he publicly criticizes the lack of protections in the Inflation Reduction Act, a bill many Democrats consider their marquee accomplishment.
[…] Some Democrats say the shift in tone and approach initially came as a surprise to the White House. “I would say they were not necessarily anticipating that kind of hardball,” said Rep. Hillary Scholten, D-Grand Rapids. “Obviously, I don’t work in the White House, I don’t have a direct channel. But I know it caught a number of us by surprise, and I heard that the White House was like, ‘What is happening here?’”
Public rebuke from a key constituency is a challenge to the White House in its own right. But a strike across all three Detroit automakers (which many experts predict is possible, if not likely, come September) could have sweeping effects for the United States economy and, by extension, Biden’s reelection campaign.
A UAW strike across all three automakers (which is the likely scenario if a strike happens, instead of against just one) could cost the U.S. economy $5 billion if it lasts even 10 days, according to one report. So, yeah, Biden has a very fine line to walk here.
Monterey Car Week Goes Electric
Let’s go a bit less heavy for a moment, shall we? I personally wonder about the relevance of fancy events like Monterey Car Week as this industry increasingly becomes driven by batteries and software. But a few brands are using it as a reason to show off their top-shelf electric stuff to an affluent audience.
Tech website Inverse has a roundup of some notable examples, including the Acura ZDX we saw yesterday, a special-edition Kia EV6 and some other entries from Leuxs and Pininfarina. And InsideEVs highlights this other EV sports car from Acura that looks an awful lot like an NSX:
This is the Electric Vision Design Study, and it bears a striking resemblance to the now-discontinued NSX sports car. Sculpted alongside the ZDX at the Acura Design Studio in Los Angeles, the front is equipped with slim vertical headlights that nearly mimic the look of Acura’s IMSA Prototype racer. There’s a corresponding light bar that extends across the slightly pointed nose as well, and an illuminated Acura badge on the hood – all in a fluorescent green color.
“Our Acura design team in Los Angeles is dreaming up the future of Acura Precision Crafted Performance in the EV era,” notes Dave Marek, Acura’s executive creative director. “This latest expression of an all-electric high-performance model is inspiring everyone in our design studio to push the boundaries ad we wanted to share the fun with our Acura fans.”
Acura says that the Electric Vision Design Study provides a sneak peek at a potential sporty EV. But the company isn’t confirming whether or not this concept will reach production, nor does the Electric Vision Design Study have any real power or performance figures to report.
I wish we could see more than the dark silhouette with neon streaks, but I’m glad Acura’s finding ways to (maybe) keep the supercar alive in the future.
Inside China’s ‘EV Graveyards’
I see photos of this going around social media a lot, and maybe you do too: fields of abandoned EVs in China, usually framed as examples of how this technology has “failed” and nobody “wants them.” The truth, according to the video above and this story from Bloomberg, is more complicated but no less distressing. They’re from ride-hailing companies that went kaput.
Why didn’t anyone buy them? Because these kinds of small, cheap, low-quality EVs, though ideal for rideshare, aren’t what Chinese buyers want anymore. Not after Tesla started producing EVs there in 2020 and forced everyone to up their game:
This time, the cars were likely deserted after the ride-hailing companies that owned them failed, or because they were about to become obsolete as automakers rolled out EV after EV with better features and longer driving ranges. They’re a striking representation of the excess and waste that can happen when capital floods into a burgeoning industry, and perhaps also an odd monument to the seismic progress in electric transportation over the last few years.
About a decade ago, encouraged by government subsidies, hundreds of automakers across China, both established players and startups, waded into electric-car manufacturing. They churned out huge numbers of early-stage EVs — relatively no-frills cars whose batteries in some instances could only run for around 100 kilometers (62 miles) on a charge.
Those vehicles were mostly bought by ride-hailing companies that leased them to drivers. “At the beginning of China’s EV market, delivery numbers were driven by car-sharing fleets,” said Young Huang, a senior analyst with JSC Automotive, a consultancy with offices in Shanghai and Stuttgart. “Only a few private customers chose to buy them.”
Try and “scale” too fast and this is what happens. And yes, they are an absolute mess to deal with:
The graveyards are a troubling consequence of that consolidation. Not only are the sites an eyesore, getting rid of EVs so quickly reduces their climate benefit considering they’re more emissions-intensive to build and only produce an advantage over combustion cars after a few years. Each of the vehicles’ spent batteries also contain precious ingredients like nickel, lithium and cobalt — metals that could be recycled to make China’s EV industry more environmentally friendly.
According to local media reports, the government of Hangzhou has vowed to dispose of the cars, which started to accumulate in 2019. But when Bloomberg News visited late last month, reporters uncovered several sites filled with abandoned EVs in the city’s Yuhang and West Lake districts after scouring satellite images and hacking through overgrown dirt paths.
So now you have a fuller picture of what really happened. Maybe they’ll end up as makeshift armored vehicles in Ukraine.
NYC Proposes Taxis, Ride-Hail Vehicles To Go Zero Emission By 2030
This one’s a bit more of a local story for folks like Matt and me, but trust me, it’s interesting. And it has broader implications for cities and the auto market.
This week, New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced an aggressive plan to make all NYC taxi and livery cars—including ride-hail vehicles from Uber and Lyft—either wheelchair-accessible or zero-emission by 2030. Unless hydrogen stations pop up everywhere in Brooklyn and Toyota Mirai sales somehow blow up as a result, we can assume that means EVs.
From SI Live, here’s the proposed phase-in process:
Those benchmarks would increase on the following schedule:
- 2025: 15% zero-emission or wheelchair-accessible vehicles
- 2026: 25% zero-emission or wheelchair-accessible vehicles
- 2027: 45% zero-emission or wheelchair accessible vehicles
- 2028: 65% zero-emission or wheelchair-accessible vehicles
- 2029: 85% zero-emission or wheelchair-accessible vehicles
- 2030: 100% zero-emission or wheelchair-accessible vehicles
Uber and Lyft actually support this, as does Revel, another ride-hail company that already operates on an all-EV basis with Teslas and some Kias. The plan isn’t finalized yet and will depend on public comments and the usual process.
Now, unless you live here or visit for business or pleasure often, why do you care? Because this speaks to an issue we cover here a lot—EV affordability. And as great as this idea is, I’m wondering where the hell all these EVs are supposed to come from. It’s the perfect example of why we need more affordable EVs and soon. (Another issue is wheelchair-accessible vehicles, which can be expensive, clunky, difficult-to-maintain conversion jobs that are rarely “green.”)
There are a couple of reasons that NYC’s taxi landscape is overwhelmingly dominated by previous-generation Camrys and RAV4s, often hybrids. They’re tough as nails, for one, but they’re also already ubiquitous. I’m not sure there are any EVs for sale in America I’d describe that way; the Tesla Model Y and Model 3 come closest but they’re not exactly Toyota-reliable.
From what I understand, the EV taxi plan here does depend on more of those cars entering the used market in the next few years. But the city is gonna need a lot of them to pull this off. It’s another reason GM was smart to un-cancel the Chevrolet Bolt; the world will need smaller, more affordable fleet-friendly EVs in the coming years. And the Equinox EV could probably use the backup. That, or the NYC taxi of the future—a lofty and iconic position held by the Checker cabs, Chevy Caprice, Ford Crown Victoria and now the Toyotas—will be a Tesla.
I dunno how I feel about that.
If anyone asks, my ideal outcome is NYC runs nothing but Hyundai Ioniq 5 and 6 cabs like they have in Seoul right now. I’d never get sick of seeing those rad-looking cars everywhere. The city can really lean into the Blade Runner vibes then, especially since we have the climate for it now.
Your Turn
Where do you think the next great affordable EV will come from? Who’s going to make that a reality?
Imagine you’ve been a pothead for twenty years working for Ford. Suddenly, you’re fired cause you can’t pass a drug test required of you to drive the forklift that the UAW won’t.
I still completely stand behind the UAW, despite loathing them as an engineer for the past 20 years.
Yesterday I praised Ford for the b-e-a-utifil GTD, now this.
This is a friggen emotional roller coaster.
Affordable the big three of japan market once they make money.
The EV taxis do make sense if you are not an independent The depot would have a few haring that can do deliveries Plus think of the glut of Panther bodies at the auctions.
The biggest issue I see with union contracts is they rarely contain clauses to cover the need for mid-contract negotiation. When the current contracts were hammered out, no one expected inflation to go crazy. The 40% they are asking for it to catch the workers up to the raises a lot of other people got, but they didn’t. There needs to be clause that states “If CPI is at least Y% for X months, the annual raises must be renegotiated”.
I would also like to see a clause about holidays. I work at a union facility that has worked Juneteenth the past two years. Why? Because the agreed holidays were all in the contract that was ratified before June 2021. We are down for Juneteenth next year though!
What you are referring to is covered by COLA – cost of living allowance. No negotiation in the middle of a contract -automatic wage adjustment to cover cost of living increases. It used to be more common but at least in my neck of the woods is pretty rare these days.
Honestly I have a lot of hopes for the Fiat 500e in the US. That being said I’m really not an EV guy anymore. If I had to get one I’d rather convert something old than buy something new that has mandatory OTA updates that can easily software limit or worst case brick your EV.
Like with Windows OS I usually wait to see if there are any security issues and or massive bugs before I update, with a ton of new cars you don’t get that option.
I would much rather have to go to the automaker’s website and download the update to a flash drive and then plug it in my car to update the software.
I get where you are coming from here. It often feels like my car is on the “developer” release branch and not the “stable” branch.
Same here, but even with ICE. If their incompetent programming department can’t get their shit right and an update is so damn necessary, then I’ll take it into the dealer to get an upload and they can deal with it if the update nerfs the car. I don’t want any of these assclowns to have OTA access to my vehicle.
Agreed
Nothing new about moving white-collar workers out to the line during a strike. My dad was an engineer at Caterpillar, and he was out assembling wheel loaders during a strike in the ’80s. Made for a tense summer on our block; damn near everyone else’s dad was a union line worker.
I was going to say, isn’t crossing the line an invitation to get your ass kicked?
If you are management, I think they get that you are doing your job. It is different than being a new non-union hire scab brought in to replace you. Scabs will get their ass kicked.
As I posted elsewhere, my Dad was a manager at a power plant. When there was a strike, he switched to working 12 hours a day, 7 days a week to keep the place running. He came home everyday, so he was crossing the line every day. He said there was never any trouble. They did have a contingency to have staff live in the plant if things got to where management couldn’t safely get in and out. Can’t just abandon a power plant.
Thanks for the insight
Yup, my dad was management for UPS during their last strike in the 90’s. He was driving a truck that summer. Luckily he started there as a driver in the 70’s and not much had changed in said truck.
Only a short time after hiring in at an Aerospace company after moving from out of state the workers went on strike. I was a salaried manufacturing engineer, and we salaried folks tried to step in and do the work the real workers did. Oh, how terrible we were at those jobs, and slow. Fortunately the strike was short, and the real folks fixed our goofs and we went on. I was somewhat anti-union at the time (I have since switched sides), new to the job, and dealing with a pregnancy at home, so lots of incentives for me to keep my job at the time. It was weird driving through the strikers though.
Not a great situation but it was probably VERY good for you as a manufacturing engineer to do some actual manufacturing.
It was extremely revealing to me and greatly improved my docs to the shop having some real experience in that shop.
I’m sure it’s been said before, but manufacturing engineers should spend time on production floor, even if they aren’t doing any of the labor, as a mandatory part of the curriculum.
They should spend a couple of weeks performing maintenance on their designs. Then maybe you wouldn’t have to remove a half shaft to replace an alternator.
Scabbing supervisors? Got the busted wrist and 6 weeks off on Workers Comp!
Back in the 80s Hostess new owners thought they’d teach the unions a lesson and shut down the Detroit Wonder Bakery. Teamsters responded by refusing to truck in bread from other bakeries and Hostess countered by dragging in supervisors who somehow got a CDL to truck in the bread. So the flunky supervisor of the mechanics takes our best tractor and trailer to Detroit and the antique trailer I get stuck with breaks a spring while we load it. Now it’s sitting low and the dock ramp is a steep uphill, and we have to unload it… Slipped and landed on my wrist= 6 weeks of Workers Comp!
That was just petty cash- Hostess had over half the Detroit Market for bread and after the strike Wonder slowly slipped away…
The CDL law was passed in 1986 but didn’t go into effect until 1992, so no CDL was required at the time of your strike.
Correct, but my state and almost every other required a “Class A” license to drive semis, I’ve held one since 1968 when they were called a “Chauffers License”.
I’m sure Ford’s excellent QC will prevent this from becoming an issue. Hold on for a second I’m getting a call…oh. OH. Okay. Got it. Never mind.
Just play your fucking employees decent wages you stupid assholes. You’re raking in absolutely absurd profits while squeezing every single penny out of the mortals that you can through your shit wages and outrageous price gouging while your entire C suite is literally bathing in money on their 2nd yachts.
Guess what? Without labor you ain’t got shit. It’s well past time for all of us to take stands against the robber baron class of the second gilded age. Ford can get fucked. If you would’ve asked me a few years ago if I’d consider a Ford I’d have said “hell yeah” with all the exciting new products they were churning out. But today? Absolutely not. Between their dipshit CEO, constant recall palooza, and the endless price gouging I’m out.
Eat the rich!
Correct!
I hear “the rich” pairs well with cake.
But how will we ever slice it?
I’ve never understood what the heck is meant by this.
Literally it means cannibalism, figuratively it means vote for people who promise to tax the shit out of the rich and redistribute the wealth (most often poorly). It’s not communism if the proletariat votes it into law.
See, I’d agree with the ‘pay your workers more’ statement if UAW dues were not mandatory.
If someone wants to be in a Union they should have to contribute to said Union in some way that the Union accepts. If someone doesn’t want to be part of the Union they shouldn’t be forced to give the Union money.
That all being said Ford is the best at coming out with automobiles people want only for them to artificially limit production, cheap out on parts only to pay 2x or more in recall costs, let their dealers charge massive markups and or sell orders out from customers, etc.
Noone can screw over Ford worse than Ford screws themselves daily.
As a casual reader or r/justrolledintotheshop, Ford engineering doesn’t inspire confidence
If you don’t want to pay union dues then don’t work where there’s a union. Plenty of places out there where you can be let go without a moments notice.
So whole industries should be off limits for people who don’t want to be part of a union? In some states you HAVE to pay teacher’s union dues if you want to be a teacher. I knew someone who was actively a meth addict and was still assembling transmissions for Chrysler products and they boasted about how they couldn’t get fired because they were UAW.
I bet if people had the option for the transmission in their car to be made by either a meth addict union worker or a sober non union worker they’d go with the sober guy.
It depends, whose better at the job? Being an addict of meth or anything else doesn’t mean that they aren’t capable of being better than some sober dipshit.
The above example is implying they’re both equally qualified and experienced. Obviously if one is a lot better than the other you’d pick the better one. But if both are equally good at assembling transmissions you’d go with the sober guy as they’re the least likely to make mistakes during assembly.
Yeah, the UAW told Ford to go fuck themselves, but Ford took it too literally 😛
If anyone is considering a Ford, be sure to watch out for vehicles with production dates during a potential strike, if it comes to that.
It sounds like the production lines would be shut down. The salaried people would just be shuttling parts around. Should be ok if they don’t drop them.
NYC running all e-cars would be a disaster. It’d be impossible to shoehorn that level of infrastructure needed. There just isn’t room to do it safely.
As far as the UAW strike talk, I don’t think they are actually gonna strike. But, here is the thing, if they did it could be partially mitigated. It doesn’t take that long to train someone on a forklift or work a press. 3-4 days maybe would suffice in a pinch. A couple of OSHA videos and a few blips and blunders along the way and the scabs could fake it for a while. Yes, there will be a few injuries and some lawsuits that can be settled out of court, but it can be done. Speaking of training…
This is exactly why the railroad workers got totally screwed. You can’t plug and play Engineers and Conductors with a week or even two weeks or even five months of training. Everybody knows that and that’s why the strike wasn’t allowed to happen. The powers that be ended up saying “shut up and take your scraps.” Outside of a few days of quiet resentment (media-wise) in the operations workers’ circles, nobody said shit about it because it had to be squashed ASAP.
That was the lowest point of Biden’s tenure so far. What a fucking disappointment.
That was shitty, but I would argue the lowest point was abandoning Afghan allies who risked their lives to help us only to be left behind to be tortured and murdered.
Well yeah that sucked too. The only caveat was that they inherited the Afghanistan shitshow with no positive outcome no matter what was done. Not that gives them a pass, just that the RR thing was 100% on Biden.
I could go into a whole thing, but I’m not gonna. Yeah, there have been many “blunders” that are pretty much par for the course for any group in power, but the railroad screw-job is the one that sticks in my craw. There is no coming back from that hypocrisy from the “Train Guy” administration for me. Total betrayal.
John Deere tried it and they failed.
Seriously, who in their right mind would buy a hilariously cheap Chinese EV with comically low range? /s
How cheap???
i doubt that “you’re sworn to secrecy” is enforceable.
employees CAN be required to swear/affirm an oath (.e.g. healthcare workers and hippocratic oath), but that is a pre-employment issue.
perhaps this is an interpretation of “trade secrets” clause of employment agreement.
Salaried employees are “at-will” anyways, so it doesn’t really matter.
Not calling my boss a jackass to his face isn’t legally enforceable either, but they certainly would shitcan me over it.
yes, i agree.
at least one employee called bs on the threat and dropped a dime to the detroit free press…
Companies push things that are unenforceable all the time. I’ve definitely worked a number of places that even went into the illegal request of not talking about our salaries with coworkers. This one probably isn’t a protected right, like discussing compensation with fellow workers, so they’d likely be able to can people if they wanted, but those people could likely collect unemployment, since it probably wouldn’t be sufficient cause for denial.
And I’ll argue that this sort of Keystone Kops attempt at clandestine undertakings is an even worse look.
The combination of hubris and lack of sense from companies like Ford never ceases to amaze me. Of course they are going to utilize their white-collar workers during any strike; companies have done that for years. Even people who don’t like Ford and large corporations in general will simply shrug their shoulders at the manifestly unsurprising news. Yet, instead of owning it they try to conceal that it’s happening and just embarrass themselves because there’s no way to keep an undertaking of that scale quiet. All it takes is one leak and the word is out.
The next great affordable EV will come from marketing. It might be the revived Bolt, but the important part will be a marketing blitz to convince everyone that it’s both great and affordable, when it is likely to be neither.
It’ll come in under the average new vehicle transaction price, of course, and we’ll be told that it’s crammed a lot of value into the vehicle, but it won’t be great. It’ll have features they can point to, and it’ll favorably compare to their carefully chosen competition (which will likely be something at a higher price with similar features, but better interior and better appearance).
And we’ll eventually get used to that being the benchmark for an affordable vehicle.
One, fucking unionize. Maybe then Ford won’t be paying you insult wages. (No, seriously. Most of the infra people can literally double their salary going literally anywhere else.)
Two, this is exactly what’s going to happen.
Again, unionize. UAW should be happy to have you. Unionize. “Don’t talk about your salary. Don’t talk about our plans. Don’t talk about unreasonable demands. Don’t discuss benefits. Don’t ask the other guy what he’s making. Don’t ask what your non-technical Peter Principal VP is making. Don’t talk about money.”
Fuck that.
You’re being taken advantage of and outright abused on every level. Talk to your coworkers. Coordinate with them. Notify the NLRB that you are striking over unfair labor practices. Demanding you do work outside the scope of what you were hired for, being forced to travel or relocate, for no additional pay? That’s unfair labor practices.
Refuse to cross the picket line, refuse to accept the heaping plate of dog shit you’re being fed.
Well of course they did. The absolute unchallengeable fact is that China is 99% propaganda, 1% covering up the reality, 0.001% actually innovative in any way whatsoever. Those cars are there because they are tofu dreg construction, just like everything else.
Build, build, build. Take any and every shortcut. Quality doesn’t matter; we can paper over it. And even if we can’t, it doesn’t matter, appearance over substance. The state will ensure the outside world doesn’t know the reality, and the locals have no choice in the matter.
And if you believe for one second China has any interest in it, much less capability, then I have a bridge to sell you in Brooklyn. China is building coal burning power plants out of tofu dreg concrete as fast as they can. They’ve been buying up and building lithium and cobalt mines as fast as they can, and screw the environment.
The only ‘recycling’ that they’re likely to be engaging in is throwing the batteries into open fire pits and the bodies into slag iron smelters.
And how quickly people forget the attempt to mandate the Nissan NV200 as the official NYC Taxi. What, y’all forgot? Nissan won a contract in 2011 to supply $1B worth of NV200’s as the official NYC taxi. The lawsuit was settled in 2015, and the courts and NYC Taxi and Limo Commission formally imposed it as the official taxi, period.
And the NV200 was cromulent for the purpose. Fuel economy wasn’t terrible. Being a van, it was wheelchair accessible. The original price for hacks was to be about $30,000 to $40,000. The other 47 ‘approved’ cars were to be pushed aside and phased out.
Hell, the official Taxi of Tomorrow “webportal” is still up! (And still embarrassing.)
Which was of course, the whole point of the Taxi of Tomorrow(R). Everybody would buy a new, affordable, highly fuel efficient vehicle. At $1B and a $30-40k estimate, that’s nearly 25,000 new NV200’s. For about 13,500 medallions in 2016. Meaning more than anything, service and replacement would be covered for many years. Along with plans to also deploy the NV200’s BEV version later.
Fleets would be standardized, they would have a guaranteed supply, cabs would be accessible and efficient, etcetera, etcetera. But Nissan was pretty much forced to give up and terminated the NV200 in 2021, even though the taxi price ended up below the original estimates.
So now if you counted every single BEV on sale in the US that could meet just the ‘wheelchair accessible’ criteria, you’d end up with a grand total of zero. And if you make it hybrids, it’s still zero. I found exactly zero hybrid wheelchair conversions, nationwide. (Oh, and they’d cost over $80k.)
But sure. Let’s blow up all that work as well as all the money spent on the lawsuits and just start over. With absolutely nothing resembling an idea as to how we’re going to meet any of the stated requirements.
triple_facepalm.jpeg
Which would be nice for some people. Except the Ioniq is decidedly not friendly to wheelchairs or other mobility issues. Which supposedly taxis exist to help with. On moderate to bad days, I would legitimately have trouble getting into the back seat of an Ioniq 6. I can only imagine how difficult it would be for someone who’s leg is in a cast, or is using crutches.
If the goal is equitable access to taxis, that means the NV200 and similar was always the only reasonable and best choice. Sure, they’re not as pretty. Not as efficient either. But they’re the best thing for the job.
I actually will not take an NV200 cab on principle. I’ll wait for another one or call a Lyft. They’re that miserable to be in. I figure I have eternity to be in a coffin after I’m dead; I don’t need to experience one right now.
Wait so why didn’t the NV200 replace all the taxis? I remember the big todo but missed the whimpering failure. Article, please!
Wikipedia to the rescue
damn I got lmgtfy’d
A coffin is far less utilitarian. But the point does stand: the NV200 and similar are the only real answer.
Just maybe not the NV200 unless they figure out how to make functional HVAC and seats from something other than granite.
“So now if you counted every single BEV on sale in the US that could meet just the ‘wheelchair accessible’ criteria, you’d end up with a grand total of zero. And if you make it hybrids, it’s still zero. “
No… in the case of hybrids, it’s at least two… the Pacifica hybrid and Sienna hybrid come in ‘accessible’ form. Just look at the NYC approved vehicle list here:
https://www.nyc.gov/site/tlc/businesses/yellow_cab_hackup.page
And we won’t have any accessible BEV taxis in NYC until a company gets around to making a fully electric minivan.
NYC needs EVs for rideshare and taxis.
Field of abandoned rideshare EVs sitting in China.
Yellow paint.
PROBLEM SOLVED
An executive running a forklift? Someone better have workers comp on line 1.
And for the love of all that’s holy, please get video and post often!
No executive is gonna be running a forklift. I don’t see that level of ambition LOL. It will be people like foreman and second line supervision. And some random manufacturing grunts.
While partially accurate, this is a pretty uncharitable way to frame what is at its heart an extremely difficult problem to solve. If the average person saw the amount of engineering that was required to create one of those vans, they’d have a different appreciation for the expense and complication.
It is a difficult problem for sure. I have a family member who works in the accessible ride space and they have a miserable time sourcing cars at reasonable cost, not to mention keeping them running. The complexity exists for a reason but it comes with sacrifices.
This is why the MV-1 showed so much promise, even though the company went kaput. I know a few wheelchair users who really swore by those things. Damn shame people with disabilities don’t have better options from the factory: https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/a15098391/2016-mobility-ventures-mv-1-first-drive-review/
The best solution on a budget is often a full size van equipped with a lift, rather than a converted minivan. The latter is more seamless as a passenger vehicle, but costs a lot more and has a lot more to go wrong.
The lift costs a couple grand and can be installed in a Transit or Promaster by a reasonably competent person, compared to a minivan that literally needs to have the floor cut out of it and a conversion cost that might be $30,000 or more.
But the Promasters and Transits are fucking miserable to ride in. I tagged along many times in a wheelchair-ized hightop on the streets of Boston. Awful.
Sure, there’s a reason those who can afford them go for the minivans.
Just someone who has a lot of experience in this field offering some perspective on a cost savings possibility.
London went EV it it’s pretty nice. No reason why NYC’s goal is unreasonable.
Of all of the manufactures, it is BYD that seems most willing to try new and radical things.
I think they will be the ones to not just make an affordable EV, but a wide assortment of affordable EVs in the near to medium-term future. Small pickup trucks, sports cars, hot hatches, sedans, electric muscle cars… you name it. They can undercut anyone, are willing to make vehicles that resist planned obsolescence, and they aren’t afraid to lose money because they have the Chinese government backing them. They play the very long game, and will probably come out ahead. A massive economic and/or energy/resource crisis or series of them will probably be a massive advantage to them because almost everyone else has ignored the possibility of these scenarios.
What’s your definition of affordable? Affordable for the sub-middle class? Middle class? Will we have new $20k EVs sitting on lots, nope. Plus, do you think the sub-middle class make enough to get the tax breaks, nope.
100 percent emissions free OR wheel chair accessible? Forget EVs, bring on the brodozers with chairlifts.
White collar workers really need to see things for what it is and start unionizing themselves. Really disgusting and tone deaf look on Ford but given how they’ve been running things lately I am not surprised. It starts with Farley and he is flailing.
Engineers may be able to unionize, but any kind of management, even first line supervisors, are banned from unionization.
How is that even legal
Managers are viewed as representatives of the company, and therefore cannot collectively bargain against its interests. Not only is it legal, it is baked into the foundation of the labor movement. Managers are the enemy, nevermind if they’re getting screwed too.
The UAW is a dying breed, at least in the automotive business. (I think they are doing pretty well in public healthcare and government jobs.) The UAW couldn’t even organize Tesla Fremont which HAD PREVIOUSLY BEEN UAW under GM/Toyota in the most progressive state in the country with a Democratic administration in DC.
Honestly, I don’t think we will ever see a great or affordable EV. If you think the Chinese will come in and save us, You got another thing coming.
Why the cloak and dagger? This tactic is common knowledge, or at least I assumed it was. I was a young engineer just out of college when contract negotiations went down literally to the final hours with the steelworkers union and I was told to pack a bag because we were coming in (being locked inside, actually) to run the mill in the event of a strike.
I assume the secrecy is largely meant to prevent people from talking to friends/family and being told not to cross the picket line. And maybe because the optics of strikebreaking, whether with outside contractors or retrained employees, aren’t great.
It does feel like one of those open secrets, though.
It may be different in a warehouse environment where presumably they don’t need people on site 24/7, but part of the rationale for locking the salaried employees in at the steel mill was specifically to not cross the picket line (not because the company cared about optics, but to protect us from retaliation from our former and future “co-workers”).
Sorry, I meant “crossing the picket line” as in working during the strike, not physically crossing the line, though that rationale for locking you in makes sense. But, yeah, part of the secrecy would be to avoid retaliation and part would likely be to avoid pressure (and possibly threats or requests for sabotage).
Agreed. This is SOP. My engineer father had to fill in as a lineman when Detroit Electric union workers went on strike many years ago. Because of that experience, he designed and patented a tool to make the job better!