Free drop-in on Market Square, Friday 2 October, 10am to 3pm: EV test drives, e-bikes and heat pump advice. Plus what the new DfT charger figures show.
Central Bedfordshire Council will run a free electric vehicle and home energy drop-in on Leighton Buzzard Market Square on Friday 2 October, 10am to 3pm. Visitors can sit in electric cars, take test drives and get advice on charging, solar panels and heat pumps. The council says it is free to attend, open to everyone and an informal drop-in. (Central Bedfordshire Council, 28 August 2026)
It is called Be Green Go Electric. The council says it will bring together:
- the latest electric vehicles, with local dealerships and test drives
- home and public charging advice
- e-bikes to try
- practical advice on solar panels, heat pumps and energy efficiency
- grant funding, and carbon advice for local businesses
It is run with Let’s Experience Electric, supported by Leighton-Linslade Town Council and the Energy Saving Trust.
Councillor Tracey Wye is the council’s executive member for sustainability and climate change. In the announcement she said “it’s easy to get overwhelmed by the different choices, what would suit your situation, and if there is or isn’t funding available”. Visitors, she said, could “get impartial advice” and “even take an electric car for a test drive”.
What Leighton Buzzard actually has to charge with
The council has installed 152 7kW charge points across 19 sites in Central Bedfordshire since the start of 2023. Three of them are in Leighton Buzzard and Linslade:
- Baker Street car park, Baker Street, LU7 1FP
- Linslade Memorial Playing Field car park, Mentmore Road, LU7 2NZ
- The Vynes car park, Weston Avenue, LU7 4JT
Each site has four dual-socket 7kW charge points, so eight vehicles at once. The council says these take 6 to 10 hours for an average car, and are meant for residents without a driveway rather than for topping up in a hurry. They are run by BP Pulse on its national tariffs. (Central Bedfordshire Council, charging electric vehicles)
One line on that page needs reading carefully. It says “there is no fee to using the parking space”. That is straightforward at Linslade Memorial Playing Field and The Vynes, which are free car parks. Baker Street is a council-charged car park with chargeable hours of 8am to 6pm Monday to Saturday, and the council publishes no tariff for it, only a two-hour limit. If you plan a six to ten hour charge there, check the signs on site.
None of the council’s rapid chargers are in Leighton Buzzard. Since the start of 2024 it has installed 34 50kW rapid points across eight sites:
- Dunstable, three sites
- Houghton Regis, two sites
- Shefford, one
- Sandy, one
- Stotfold, one
Leighton-Linslade Town Council’s own page says the district council “has plans for the provision of rapid charge points in the town centre”, but gives no date. (Leighton-Linslade Town Council)
Central Bedfordshire has been awarded £1,761,000 from the government’s Local Electric Vehicle Infrastructure fund, which is for low-power residential charging, and says it will work with town and parish councils on where it goes.
The number that fell, and why it did not mean chargers were removed
The Department for Transport published its latest public charging figures on 27 August. Central Bedfordshire’s count had been rising: 605 public chargers on 1 January 2026, then 620 on 1 April. On 1 July 2026 it was 530. Rapid and ultra-rapid chargers in the district did not follow it down. Those went 194, then 208, then 209. (DfT table EVCI0102, 1 July 2026)
That fall of 90 is bigger than the net fall across the whole East of England, which went from 9,887 to 9,880.
It is not what it looks like. Every 1 July figure in the DfT tables carries note 5, which says one charge point operator removed about 1,270 chargers from its public data in June 2026 because they were private-access points “reported improperly as public chargers”. The DfT states plainly that this “does not reflect an increase in the number of chargers being uninstalled or decommissioned and instead it reflects an improvement to the quality of reporting.”
So the honest reading is that Central Bedfordshire has fewer chargers on paper than in April, and that some of what was counted in April was never available to the public in the first place. The DfT’s figures come from Zapmap.
Even after the correction, the district is not badly served by regional standards:
| Area | Public chargers per 100,000 people, 1 July 2026 |
|---|---|
| Milton Keynes | 322.7 |
| Central Bedfordshire | 167.8 |
| Bedford | 149.2 |
| Buckinghamshire | 141.3 |
| North Hertfordshire | 117.3 |
| Luton | 64.8 |
| England, for comparison | 172.7 |
| East of England, for comparison | 150.2 |
The per-head figures use ONS mid-2024 population estimates, and the DfT publishes these statistics under its “official statistics in development” label. The next update is due in November 2026.
What it means for you
If you are weighing up an electric car, 2 October is the cheap way to try one. Test drives, e-bikes and advice on grants are all free, and the council says the format is an informal drop-in rather than a booked session.
If you have no driveway, the three council sites in town are the ones aimed at you, and they are slow by design: 7kW, six to ten hours. In the council’s own car park directory, Baker Street lists 10 EV bays, Hockliffe Street 2 and the West Street multi-storey 2. Tariffs, opening hours and the free windows are on our Leighton Buzzard parking page.
If you need a fast charge, you are currently leaving town for it. The council’s own rapid sites are in Dunstable, Houghton Regis, Shefford, Sandy and Stotfold.
Market Square is in the town centre, so check what is happening on the roads before you drive in: our Leighton Buzzard roadworks and travel page is updated with current closures.
The council takes suggestions for charge point locations by email at begreen@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk, and says a request does not guarantee an installation.
Have your say