[thefro526]

The only way the vehicle described in the original post would be effective is if it were used for city or local driving only. And even if that was all of the driving you did you'd still need to be bringing in a decent bit of money to afford it. In reality the range isn't bad for most of my family and friends that drive if they were to get one but, the price would alienate a lot of people.

Something else that needs to be factored in is recharge time. I own a 91 Nissan 240sx and it takes about 3 or 4 minutes to fill it's 15 gallon tank. Considering most cars have between a 12-20 gallon tank their refill time should be less than 5 minutes on average. Your electric car would take substantially longer to my knowledge. If you could find a way to charge the battery fully in less than maybe 10 minutes it would become practical. But to my knowledge most electric cars take a few hours or more to fully recharge.

If you had a short range car like the one described that could be recharged quickly <10 minutes then some people who drive less than ~40 miles to work everyday could use them and charge the car at work or at a recharge station. But if you were to have a car with a 200 mile + range you could get away with having a longer recharge time. I know a lot of electric car owners let their cars "sleep" or plug them in to charge at night.