Tesla is now taking votes for its next Supercharger locations

Tesla is now taking votes for its next Supercharger locations

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

The next Supercharger station location is up to Tesla owners.

The all-electric automaker put out the invitation to vote on new locations via its Tesla Charging Twitter account but had originally announced its intention to democratize Supercharger station expansion last month. Tesla owners can log in to participate via their user accounts and can vote for up to five locations in the list of 183 possible sites. There’s even a page where you can suggest a location that’s not on the list yet.

Vote for a Supercharger ⚡️ https://t.co/PFYek5I7sm

— Tesla Charging (@TeslaCharging) October 20, 2022

Currently, Lake Okeechobee, Florida, is in the lead with 558 votes (at the time of writing). The town of about 5,000 people doesn’t have any Supercharging station, with the closest one being 32 miles east in Fort Pierce. There aren’t any Tesla Level 2 destination charging in town, either, according to PlugShare.

Lake Okeechobee does, however, have a DC fast charging station near the center of town that plays nice with all other EV manufacturers. Tesla customers in the US can buy an adapter to convert CHAdeMO plugs, and Tesla recently released a CCS Combo 1 adapter as well, but not all cars can support the latter without a Tesla service upgrade. In that regard, Lake Okeechobee seems to be a good candidate for a new Supercharging station.

Image: PlugShare

With no Supercharging stations around, PlugShare user William charged their Model S with a CHAdeMO adapter at this Okeechobee, FL FPL EVolution station.

In fourth place, we have Starbase, Texas, at 451 votes at time of writing. That is SpaceX’s spaceport in Boca Chica, where the company produces rockets like the Falcon Heavy and has many fans living nearby to observe everything SpaceX is doing. Other big votes include: Big Bear Lake, California, with 537 votes; Bolzano, Italy, with 454 votes; Laguna Beach, California, with 379 votes; Princeton, New Jersey, with 286 votes; and Philadelphia with 295 votes — which I’ll personally vote for only because the Eagles are undefeated.

Tesla owns and operates one of the largest EV charging networks in the world, consisting of 4,283 Supercharging stations and 38,883 connectors in total, according to its Q3 2022 earnings report this week. The chargers are only available to Tesla owners, though it has started to accept EVs from other companies in Europe. And Tesla is planning to do the same in the US, but it might need to alter some of the stations to work with the North American CCS1 connector standard.

Hopefully, as the Supercharger network grows, Tesla will start adding stations that support other EVs in the US soon

It’s an easier task to open up Superchargers in Europe and Asia to non-Tesla EVs since there is a standard EV connector. In North America, however, Tesla still uses a proprietary connecter to charge its cars.

Hopefully, as the Supercharger network grows, Tesla will start adding stations that support other EVs in the US soon. It’s at least warming up to the idea; Tesla just started selling a new version of its at-home Level 2 Wall Connector charger that has the widely used J1772 plug.