In 2021, the Los Angeles City Council approved an ambitious plan to bring dozens of charging stations and low-cost electric cars to South L.A., a community in desperate need of more affordable and environmentally-friendly transportation options.
Four years later, however, not a single station has been built in South Los Angeles. And the program that was expected to bring these electric cars and stations to the region has ended.
Last month, BlueLA, the city of Los Angeles’ electric car-share program, quietly shut down.
BlueLA launched in 2017 as a membership program targeting low-income residents that allowed drivers to rent electric cars by the minute at a monthly cost as low as $1 per month. It eventually grew into California’s largest electric car sharing program of its kind, according to the Los Angeles Department of Transportation (LADOT), with over 1,000 active users as of last year, about half of whom qualified for community memberships with discounted rates based on income.
In 2021, plans were announced to add at least 100 vehicles and 20 stations in South L.A., as well as hundreds of e-bikes.