Portland, ME
RequestedThis is a planning tool, not a prediction. Of the 80 numbers behind a season in Portland, 25 are published figures, 35 are worked out from published figures, and 20 are our own estimates. 43 of them were read straight out of a federal file that covers every city in the country, so there was no citation to trust and no page to misread. You can change any of them. Your result is only as good as the numbers you agree with.
Where the money goes on day one
The project is behind before the car turns a wheel. That is true in every town on this list, and it is the hole the months above are measured against.
The project is $4,634 down before the first fare: $2,900 genuinely spent, and $1,734 that vanished the moment the car stopped being new.
Two honest caveats. The permit figure is marked placeholder because the model invents it — the obligation is real, the amount is not researched. And nothing here counts sales tax, excise, title or registration on the purchase, which vary by state and this model does not yet carry, so every figure is a best case.
What comes off every fare before you see it
That 30% comes off the top — before energy, cleaning, insurance, the depot or the loan payment. Every figure on this page is already after it.
Tesla has published no owner-operator revenue share for Robotaxi, anywhere, so this is an expectation rather than a reported figure. 30% is roughly what the established ride-hail platforms take and what people following the rollout broadly expect. It is the largest single lever in the whole model: at 25% instead, the same season leaves about 7% more in your hand — more than any driving decision you can make. Fares also settle 7 days after they are earned.
Why this town is in the game
Asked for by Dave, to put Maine on the ladder. It has the dearest power on the list outside California -- 18.87 cents off-peak, against 6.5 cents in Las Vegas -- so charging cost bites harder here than anywhere else in this batch. Demand is genuinely strong for its size at 63 rides a day per thousand residents. It is also the thinnest research of the eight, holding 8 of 13 citations, so it carries more estimates than its neighbors on the ladder.
Other lenses on Portland, ME
The same research pack feeds more than one simulator. ⚡ A two-stall DC fast-charging site does not pay here under the default assumptions: about 6.1 stops a day against a break-even of 11.9, 14 public fast-charging sites already within 10 miles, payback never.
See the arithmetic and change the assumptions →
Counted again from the US DOE station list by a second route — American Adventurer’s copy of the same 2026-09-16 AFDC snapshot, filtered the same way (open, public, unrestricted, at least one DC fast port):
- Within 10 miles: 14 sites (71 fast ports) — the research pack, counted independently, says the same
- Within 25 miles: 48 sites (176 fast ports) — the research pack, counted independently, says the same
🧺 A coin laundromat does not pay here under the default assumptions: about 2,050 laundromat households inside 1.5 miles (no car, renters, owners), 560 loads a week (the store is full) against a break-even of 638, attended 84 hours a week at the local $17.74 wage, payback 59.1 years. Run unattended, nothing else changed, it pays back: payback 3.3 years.
See the arithmetic and change the assumptions →
OpenStreetMap maps no laundromat at all within 1.5 miles of the town centre as of 2026-07-09. Read that as a gap in the map, not an empty market — fifteen of the twenty-nine towns here map zero at this radius, and some of them are cities. It is the clearest possible warning not to treat this layer as a census. The model above is still splitting demand with its own editable estimate of 3 stores, which is what the payback figure rests on; move that one for the town you know. Laundromat locations: © OpenStreetMap contributors, via American Adventurer.
Camping near Portland, ME
No public-land camps within 30 miles of the town center in the American Adventurer record. That is the record, not the country: a state park or a private campground would not be in it. See the empty ring on the map →
Data: American Adventurer (davelalande.com), built 2026-09-18T07:30:56Z; read 2026-09-18. Straight-line miles from the Census town center, not driving distance; the American Adventurer record, not every campground.
What this row rests on
80 numbers describe this town. Every one of them says where it came from.
- rides_per_day: the five named sources were checked and none publishes a trip count for this city, so the estimate stands on its own arithmetic
Some of the numbers, and where they came from
A sample. The whole pack is in the data API.
Researched 2026-09-14 on pipeline 2.1.0. Measured on sim 1.5.0, 12 seeds, median reported. A result is only comparable to another from the same sim version. The camping card is the American Adventurer record within 30 straight-line miles of the Census town center, read 2026-09-18: not driving distance, and not every campground.