February 3rd, 2025Kyle’s Rant
Mostly I charge my Tesla at home with a normal 10-amp plug, which means I wake up in the morning with a full tank. That way I am ready to traverse the plethora of potholes we refer to as roads around the Hepburn Shire.

But I got caught short a little the other day and found myself at the Daylesford Town Hall’s charger. I guess I should have picked up on the clue, which was the spider webs around the handle of the charger, meaning no one had been there for a while.
It clearly wasn’t working and on further investigation it had been dead the whole time, well before Christmas right through to mid-January.
While parked in the non-operational charging bay I noticed that out from under the barrier around the Town Hall renovations white liquid with paint flakes was pouring all over the footpath and flowing into the drains.

It was clearly coming from the works behind the screen and my guess was they were water blasting the paint off.
And although on mere battery fumes I thought it my civic duty to report it to the council. To council’s credit the fix was almost immediate, in the form of a guy with a hose blasting away the evidence into the drains. WTF…
Now the only other charger in the immediate area is at the Hepburn Mineral Springs Reserve, which has two charging stalls but only one fitting suitable for a Tesla. So I limped along, by this time on four per cent battery capacity.
Luckily, a fellow who had just plugged in and was about to enjoy a two-hour treatment at the Bathhouse, gave me his spot. Thank you kind sir.
I bought the Tesla before Elon turned into even a bigger wanker than he was by joining Trump and making a Nazi salute at the president’s inauguration last Monday.
But I do think there is noticeably a lot more electric and hybrid cars on the road. In fact, over 120,000 EVs or non-ICE (internal combustion engine) cars were purchased by Australians last year.
Surely it’s time to do a bit better around the Hepburn Shire, where even in terms of tourists trying to come for a holiday, range anxiety is a huge issue.
We have the land and I am sure there are a lot of grants around; besides tourism is a huge economic driver and our local economy is flailing.
For those in the world of EVs, charging is everything, destination charges such as the 50 amp at the bathhouse or the one in the main street of Daylesford (which doesn’t even rate a mention on the Plugshare app) are okay if you are having a bit of lunch and you plan to be at a place for two to three hours.
But we need a bank of serious superchargers somewhere in the Hepburn Shire, ones that deliver 250–500 watts for a full charge in 20 minutes.
We need this infrastructure not only so we can embrace the change to electric and give locals choice as to what cars they have. We also need this infrastructure to literally drive tourists up here.
I feel like all the amazing work that has been done by local businesses and various tourist affiliations over the years to create our village destinations will go to waste if we don’t keep up. EV rant over…