Atlanta became the nation’s second-largest market for electric cars, and the top market for Nissan’s Leaf, thanks to incentives and lobbying campaigns by owners like Tim Goudie, who connects his Leaf each workday at recharging stations provided by employer Coca-Cola. Chris Aluka Berry for The Wall Street Journal Atlanta has become a surprise success for electric car makers and the reasons—state subsidies and unfettered access to carpool lanes—offer a telling lesson in what it takes to lift demand for the vehicles. Georgia provides more than $4,000 in income-tax credits on average for an electric-car purchase, cut-rate electricity, employer support of recharging stations and, in Atlanta, access to high-occupancy vehicle lanes in the city’s congested roadways. Atlanta’s emergence as the No. 2 metropolitan market in the U.S. after San Francisco for electric-vehicle sales, according to researcher IHS Automotive, illustrates how public subsidies remain key to luring buyers away from gasoline-powered […]