Dutch fast-charging company Fastned is tempting EV drivers heading on vacation to the South of France with free ice cream at its Belgian Ardennes station at Baraque de Fraiture in Vielsalm. Be there between 12 to 4 p.m. on ‘Red Saturday’ August 12th, to lick the free sweets.
The Fastnet charging station is located at the ‘Baraque de Fraiture’ near exit 50 of the E25 highway and offers eight chargers of 350 kW. It’s along one of the most popular routes for vacationers from the Netherlands and Germany over Maastricht, Liège, and Arlon in Belgium, to Luxembourg, and further into France, heading south.
Ice cream as bait
Apparently, the temptation of free ice cream on a ‘Red Saturday’ with lots of traffic jams predicted for France is a promotional stunt to lure away EV drivers from the most popular charging location on that route, the Tesla Supercharger in Arlon.
That one is situated at the Van der Valk hotel at the Route de Longwy in Arlon, which is exactly 92.4 km or one hour further along the E25. There Tesla offers 16 Superchargers at 250 kW and 14 at 150 kW. But no ice cream.
Red and Black Saturdays
Saturday, August 12th is considered one of the ‘Red Saturdays’ in the summer of 2023, where long traffic jams are expected on the European routes toward the South. Actually, the whole weekend of 11, 12, and 13 August will be saturated in countries like France, Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, and Spain. In France, August 5th was a true ‘Black Saturday’ with almost 1 000 km of traffic jams at noon.
The Dutch fast-charging pioneer opened its first charging station in Belgium in 2020 at the Ostend airport, expanding to 23 to date. Currently, it’s active with 275 fast-charging stations in Belgium, The Netherlands, France, Germany, the UK, and Switzerland. Denmark is to follow next. The goal is to build a European network of +1 000 stations by 2030.
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