re: #126 erik_t
Having the freedom to putter along on a gasoline engine if circumstances dictate is a very important mental safety blanket to drivers who aren’t used to needing to keep an exact count on how far they’ve driven since the last charge (and other more esoteric stuff like the outside air temperature). Without a complete revolution in battery chemistry, electrical infrastructure and a number of other things, electric vehicles are always going to be charged in timeframes in excess of an hour.
Problem is that a hybrid is piss-poor by either measure. When running on its batteries it’s hampered by the weight of a gasoline engine and related equipment, but when running on gas the engine is generally too small to get good mileage unless the vehicle is tiny.
If we’re to go hybrid to gain fuel mileage, then my suggestion would be to ditch the gasoline engine and promote diesel hybrids. Otherwise, as you suggest, they’re nothing more than electric cars with very heavy training wheels.