RA to vote on new standards for EV charging stations

As more and more drivers shift to sustainable vehicles, a design review board for the Reston Association is looking to formalize requirements for what electric vehicle charging stations must have outside homes and businesses.

Following a public hearing, the board agreed yesterday (Tuesday) to review process and design standards. Interior charging stations, such as those in garages, are immune from the existing and proposed rules.

“Reston Association will more than likely be one of the first associations to have a design guideline that is strictly related to electric vehicle charging stations; so we’re really happy about that,” said Cam Adams, the association’s director of covenants administration.

The proposed standards will eventually go before the RA Board of Directors for approval. A board operations committee could review the matter in October.

The association has previously noted that such charging stations already require design review board approval. But it has no formal criteria, which was part of the reasoning for creating the standards.

The new measure calls for restricting stations to 6.5 feet in height, limiting a station to have two bollards — those vertical posts used along interstate express lanes — with a same height restriction and prohibiting wooden pedestals as well as cables/cords from extending over paths, among other criteria.

It also calls for several preferences, such as using parking blocks over bollards.

About 7% of U.S. adults have an electric or a hybrid vehicle, an adoption rate that’s slower than China and Europe, according to the Pew Research Center.

The proposal says projects would require an applicant to obtain neighbors’ signatures. It also says a panel of the design review board would then review applications and apply the guidelines.

Existing stations that received design review board approval would be grandfather in, according to the association.