That's a wild statement. Not everyone replaces their vehicles every year. Some people drive a car for 10-20 (+) years before ditching it. There will assuredly still be plenty of open gas stations in 2035.
2035 is a long time away. iPhone was released 16 years ago and the world changed within the next decade.
When cheap cars and trucks really arrive the primary limit will be supply. ~nobody uses feature phones anymore. Electric vehicles could well be like that once we get real scale, and especially in countries that don’t currently have very high car ownership because they won’t be defending the old regime. Countries that embrace and accelerate this change will receive the most economic benefits.
But if the car is likely to plunge in value, I might choose to move faster to offload it. People will either do that or keep it until it dies. Enthusiastic countries will accelerate the process by increasing taxes on older vehicles.
Expecting a similar transition period is extremely naive.
Gasoline vehicles will become more expensive to maintain and run, and more of a hassle to refuel, so even people like me who like to keep their cars for ages will be forced to switch a lot earlier than normal - especially if you live in the city.
These already exist for large trucks, buses, vans and so on. They are just starting to be introduced for the oldest diesel cars.
Once the EV market share hits something like 50% (middle of next decade, ish), petrol business will be down much more than 50% from today. Many petrol stations will have disappeared. Most commercial fleets will be close to 100% electric at that point (or striving to be). Most long distance road travel will be electric. Because it's vastly cheaper than anything else at that point. Any heavy road users will switch sooner rather than later because of the cost benefits from going electric. As soon as they can basically.
EVs will be over represented in miles driven collectively. As in, people might still own ICE vehicles but they would not be driving them a lot as that would be costly. And hence not use as much fuel.
With the number of cheap (mostly chinese) BEV’s available now and coming in the pipeline we’re already seeing some very cost competitive propositions.
I think that point is very close, maybe mid-next year if all goes well.
2037-38 seems like a reasonable estimate for ICE vehicle market becoming smaller than EV, and all the accompanying things that go with it, like disappearing gas stations and more and more restrictions on ICE vehicles (e.g. city centers, commercial sales only, etc.)
If the diesel transition takes time, I think the gas pumps will also stay along the major truck routes, but one might feel like a NG fuel user looking for an airport station in regions with a lot of urban density.
(Even without these pressures, an EV is already 1/3 the price to operate so that pushes ICEs toward infrequent users which accelerates the downward spiral of gas stations and gas consumers.)
film development, pay phones, radio stations, record stores, video rental, etc...
I am not sure of this at all. At the very least, we can bet by that timeframe the number of gas stations will be going down. Why? For the same reason I don't have a Boston Market or Pei Wei near me any more. Because capitalism.
Investors will not necessarily wait for even 50% of the cars on the road to be electric before they start pulling their money out of gas stations. And especially because most stations make very little at the pump anyway -- they make most of their money in the attached convenience store. I don't know how long pumps and underground tanks last, but I would expect that by 2030 some stations will be opting out of replacing warn out pump equipment. And I expect this to start in neighborhood stations in wealthy areas first, where EV adoption and land value are both high.
And sadly, as older cars majority areas will reflect economic status and local crime, service deserts are more likely to develop.
I drive a 20 year old ice.
I expect the change to EVs will follow a similar path, and in ten years there will be "experts" looking back saying "It's unprecedented - we NEVER could have predicted this!".
