EV charging stations : Australian governments mull solutions to expand access to private and public stations

brisbanetimes.com.au · Feb 26, 2026 · Collected from GDELT

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February 27, 2026 — 4:00amElectric vehicle owners in inner-city Sydney and Melbourne are resorting to dangling charging cables out windows, stringing them through trees and laying them across footpaths, adding pressure for councils to allow more permanent solutions.Merri-bek Council in Melbourne and Inner West Council in Sydney are among councils trialling authorised options to safely allow residents without off-street parking to charge their EVs with their own power rather than relying on the small but growing public charger network.Electrification and EV advocate Sarah Aubrey is part of the Inner West Council trial using cable covers to charge an EV on the street.Wolter PeetersSam Kelley, who works for the three Sydney eastern suburbs councils of Woollahra, Waverley and Randwick, said he has seen many DIY set-ups and some of them are “super unsafe”.“We have people who go out their window and then through a tree, we have some people putting them through their gutters and drain pipes,” Kelley said. “They are usually using extension cables, and there are some safety hazards to using extension cables for charging your EV.”EV sales have already tripled in the past three years, causing emissions in the transport sector to fall for the first time since the COVID lockdowns, in what Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen said was proof that the government’s “commonsense” policies were working.EV adoption was identified by the Climate Change Authority as essential to achieve Australia’s 2035 emissions targets, but advocates warn uptake will stall in inner-city areas unless there is a faster roll-out of public chargers and options to allow people with street access but no driveway to charge vehicles with their own electricity.Energy Consumer Australia’s latest survey in December found that of the households considering buying a new car in the near future, only one in four was considering an EV.Melissa Rogerson in Brunswick East is part of a council trial for a boom to safely suspend EV charging cables above the footpath.Jason SouthIn the survey of 4000 households, 48 per cent said no charging access at home was why they would not consider buying an EV. This rose to 51 per cent in NSW and was 45 per cent in Victoria. Another 51 per cent of respondents nationally said a lack of public chargers was the main reason.The NSW Electric Vehicle Strategy acknowledges that one in three drivers in the state does not have off-street parking, and the government has invested $209 million in grants to ensure EV charging coverage. Victoria’s 2021 roadmap for zero emissions vehicles included $20 million for EV chargers that are still being rolled out.An October 2025 report from the Electric Vehicle Council gave NSW a score of 100 per cent for fast public charging and 75 per cent for other public charging, while Victoria scored 50 per cent for both. Despite this, Victoria had the highest share of EVs in new vehicle sales of any Australian state last year, council figures show.Both states have ongoing parliamentary inquiries into EV infrastructure, which each received multiple submissions from households without off-street parking who complained about the cost and accessibility of public chargers. Electricity networks such as Ausgrid are pushing to build more public chargers on power poles directly rather than partnering with EV charging specialists.Kerbo Charge in Britain has a system to create a charging gully across the footpath with a PVC self-closing lid.Kerbo ChargeSarah Aubrey, an electrification and EV advocate in Sydney, is part of Inner West Council’s trial allowing home owners with public liability insurance to lay charging cords across the footpath if they cover it with a cable mat for pedestrian safety and display a permit on their fence. About two-thirds of the council’s residents cannot charge at home, she said.Aubrey advocates for more permanent solutions such as the “charging gullies” offered by companies such as Kerbo Charge and Charge Gully in Britain, where the home owner installs a groove in the footpath for the cable with a specialised cover that sits flush with the pavement.Charge Gully offers gully charging with a lockable metal cover.Charge Gully“Of course, we need those public chargers, but to give people that chance to be able to charge cheaply from home as well,” Aubrey said. “That’s the only way you’ll get mass adoption in the inner suburbs of our cities.”Rooftop solar and batteries make charging at home cost-effective for home owners such as Aubrey, but renters can often use a normal power point or a converter to charge slowly, accessing one of the new electricity plans with a window of free daytime power or an EV charging plan that costs as little as 8 cents per kilowatt hour between midnight and 6am. By contrast, Aubrey said, the cheapest public charger on a power pole near her home was 38 cents per kilowatt hour, while many other public chargers cost more than 75 cents per kilowatt hour.Aubrey added that many women did not feel safe parking their cars at a random pole charger, then walking through a series of back alleys to collect it later that night.Inner West Council is preparing a report for other councils to use on cable covers and gully charging options, not just on the technology but also insurance and other business issues.In Melbourne, the City of Port Phillip is running a pilot to allow households without off-street parking to install private kerbside electric vehicle chargers, while Merri-bek Council has nine households so far, with more in the pipeline, testing a boom that sits in the front garden and swings over the footpath to suspend the cable high enough in the air.Melissa Rogerson said being able to charge at home was “essential” to her decision to buy an EV.Jason SouthMelissa Rogerson in Brunswick East bought her EV, a Volkswagen ID.4, in July last year, knowing that the council trial was on its way. She had the boom installed in December at a cost of $2400 for the boom (refundable if the trial does not become permanent), plus $373.50 in council fees and an additional cost for electrical upgrades. Rogerson said she has had only positive feedback from neighbours and passersby so far.The car charges between about 10am and 5pm, when they work from home or on weekends. “It’s not quite free, we have a smallish solar system, but it’s negligible. There is this perception that charging an EV is onerous. … If we’re home, it’s just charging while pottering about the house.”For Rogerson, the ability to charge at home was an “essential” to her decision to buy an EV. She was happy to use the public chargers for a few months, but found it “a little bit fiddly” since the charging providers impose a fee if the car is finished charging but still taking up space.“There are some fast local chargers ... but they weren’t just expensive, they were almost too fast,” Rogerson said. “We’d be halfway through doing our shopping, and it’d be like, ‘oh crap, the car’s finished charging, we’ve got to go move it’. It was fine, it was doable, but there was a little bit of effort that went into it.”Bondi resident Vincent Rommelaere charges his electric vehicle at the public chargers at the beach.Sam MooyEnergy Consumers Australia consumer advocacy manager Pauline Ferraz said more public chargers were needed for the EV transition to happen and for everyone to be able to participate.“We want an equitable public charging network that will suit everyone, regardless of their physical or financial circumstances,” Ferraz said. “Right now, it seems the infrastructure is rolled out in places where the EV uptake has already happened.”Vincent Rommelaere lives in a 1960s apartment block in Bondi. While it has a garage, there are already several special levies on residents for building repairs and upgrades, so EV charging infrastructure is not on the agenda.When he bought his BMW iX1, he tried plugging into the normal power point in the garage for trickle charging, which he expected to take a day and a half. It immediately tripped the fuse. Since then, he has taken the car to public chargers at the beach, or his husband has taken it to chargers at the university where he works.“I wouldn’t say it’s difficult, it’s just a different approach to owning a car,” Rommelaere said.Sam Kelley said the Waverley, Woollahra and Randwick councils had 60 per cent of residents living in apartments, 50 per cent of residents renting, and three times the NSW average of EVs on the road. The area has gone from less than 100 public charging spaces to more than 300 in the past year, he said, and the councils were also working with apartment building managers to install “smart plugs” that allow slow, low-cost charging in the common area with reimbursement to the owners’ corporation for electricity usage, and load balancing to manage electrical demand.“We see the charging world as a bit of a mosaic,” Kelley said. “We don’t think the answer is entirely all just charging in car parks or all just on poles – it’s a combination of what’s called home-to-kerb charging or private kerbside charging and public charging.“Get to the heart of what’s happening with climate change and the environment. Sign up for our fortnightly Environment newsletter.From our partners