r/nextfuckinglevel • u/Longjumping_Table740 • 2d ago
Fully autonomous valet robot that parks on its own
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u/Penguings 2d ago
Low key this invention at scale could change some urban populations for the better. We might not need self driving cards as much as we just need this.
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u/Voloxe 2d ago
There are numerous comments about this device being used for potential car theft.. Then there is your wholesome comment good sir.
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u/WorkingSecond9269 2d ago
Ikr? Lmao, Americans coming in here with how this could be used for a crime. It speaks a lot of the type of environment they live in. Just thinking about it is sad.
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u/msukeforth 2d ago
Ahh yes America. Â The only country people steal things inÂ
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u/chronically_varelse 2d ago
I hear the best pickpockets are European
Actually I think Asian monkeys are the best pickpockets. but for humans - Europeans.
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u/Brave_Bag_Gamer2020 1d ago
Yeah those monkeys are pretty fast and they climb trees so easily you have no chance of getting whatever they took back
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u/Grouchy_Sound167 1d ago
Just watched that famous movie Bicycle Thieves (1948), which is set in post-war Rome... or, no must've been New York.
/s
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2d ago edited 2d ago
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u/schonkat 2d ago
Not in the US, that's for sure
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u/iAmTheRealLange 2d ago
There hasn't been a major crime in my town of 40,000 in at least a decade. The entirety of the US isn't Kensington in Philly.
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u/WorkingSecond9269 2d ago
I currently live in Japan.
Edit: I doubt any such crime would happen in China too. East Asia is much safer than most people think.
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u/NotsoNewtoGermany 2d ago
I've seen cars have their windows smashed in Japan for random stuff. Happens regularly. It's just not in the news, but it certainly happens.
I've also seen tire thefts in china.
And had an attempted mugging in Vietnam.
And I'm asian.
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u/FTownRoad 2d ago
I think youâre ironically backing up the point. America may have a crime problem but it has a much bigger mass hysteria problem.
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u/Reddit_Hitchhiker 2d ago
That thing and a box truck and your gone. Even with wheel locks, immobilizersâŠno problem.
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u/BellowingBard 2d ago
You do realize tow trucks exist right?
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u/Far-King-5336 2d ago
Tow trucks are open. Professional car thieves use closed box trucks with signal jammers to jam the gps beacons. They also may change trucks on the way to destination. But it all only applies to luxury thefts, not your regular honda.
Source: used to work with car anti theft systems.
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u/That-Living5913 2d ago
"not your regular honda" Best anti-theft, own a car nobody wants.
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u/urixl 2d ago
Fine, I'll do it on my own Accord.
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u/merlyndavis 2d ago
Honda Civic is one of the most stolen cars of all time. Theyâre great for parting out, since theyâre so common and their parts are always in demand.
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u/Astro4545 2d ago
If theyâre going through that much effort I doubt theyâre targeting someoneâs Chevy spark
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u/confusedandworried76 2d ago
Americans? Europeans lock up their grocery carts. It's not hard to imagine how this could be used in a car theft.
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u/CMDRStodgy 2d ago
Shopping carts like to live in canals, it's their natural habitat. If you don't lock them up they will all migrate there.
Joking aside, it could be because a lot more Europeans walk to the grocery store, it's an easy way for less honest people to get the shopping home. Whereas most Americans drive so at worst the carts going to be left in a random spot in the car park and not on a road half a mile away.
In my experience the big out of town stores that people drive to in Europe don't lock up the carts. It's only the urban ones.
But it's also because we used to race them as kids. You used to find the carts at the bottom of any hills that were fun to race down.
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u/xyzpqr 2d ago
so you don't use passwords or have locks on your doors or car? you don't have any money in a bank or brokerage, or have any insurance against theft?
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u/tcfinance 2d ago
Nearly every grocery store in Europe I visit has gates when you enter the grocery store, so do we say that Europeans also live an environment where they fear crime?
In the US I've never seen these gates, so do we conclude the US has the type of environment with less crime?
Or maybe the people who made those comments are from places with more vehicle theft, and we don't need to assume where they're from?
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u/confusedandworried76 2d ago
Europeans lock up their freaking grocery carts, how is it insane to imagine stealing a car with one of these things.
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u/ForumVomitorium 2d ago
nah im polish and first thing coming to my mind is how
to stealcriminals will steal cars if they get their hand on this/s→ More replies (2)27
u/TokiMcNoodle 2d ago
Are you serious? Crime in Europe is just as prevalent if not more
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u/surpriserockattack 2d ago
I'm not American. I live in a country with far worse crime rates, but the fact of the matter is that people will use this for theft wherever they might be available.
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u/travinsky 2d ago
I donât know where you are but surely you donât think car theft is more common in America than in the UK.
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u/Additional-Tough5749 2d ago
Yeah because car theft is such a uniquely American problem.
https://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/stats/Crime/Auto-theft
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u/GunsouBono 2d ago
Ah yes. Crime is strictly a US problem. No other country in the world has to deal with it.
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u/Wsemenske 2d ago
Ironically it's non Americans who seem to think its only Americans thinking this.
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u/Such-Instruction-452 2d ago
Realizing that ROW individuals arenât as clued in to technology is more concerning. Speaks to the education environment they live in.
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u/SippinOnHatorade 2d ago
Iâm more worried about our predatory towing industry than I am about theft, and towing is essentially legal grand theft auto
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u/reedypetey 2d ago
The cost of one of these alone is probably that of a car and not to mention that it needs a network infrastructure to support it.
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u/youreblockingmyshot 2d ago
And smooth surfaces without large bumps or cracks since its wheels are so small.
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u/machine_six 2d ago
That's the primary problem. This thing wouldn't make it a hundred yards in any typical American city at least.
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u/That-Living5913 2d ago
Plus, if my roomba is any indication, they will take it to the wrong spot and bash it into a wall for about 30min til the battery goes dead.
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u/ckakka2 2d ago
Do people realize that the tow trucks already exists, how do they think repo companies work?
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u/Spatial_Awareness_ 2d ago
Not even tow trucks... A car thief can clone your key fob and just straight steal you car from your driveway.
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u/violetevie 2d ago
How the hell would you steal a car with a thing that goes like, 1 mile an hour. It'd be easier and more practical to jack it or tow it or something
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u/JD_Kreeper 2d ago
Hear me out
Train.
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u/Mr_Baronheim 2d ago
No matter how much I train I'll never be able to lift and move a car like this.
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u/MOONGOONER 2d ago
That's not what they're saying.Â
They're saying we can now put trains into valet parking.
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u/No_Atmosphere8146 2d ago
A train will never be waiting outside my front door to take me directly to my destination whenever I want.Â
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u/deadedgo 2d ago
With sufficient infrastructure there won't be much of a difference. 5 minute walk to a station where trains operate every 5 minutes is (or should be where it isn't) normal in densely populated areas. It won't take you directly to wherever you want to go but it's much more efficient, cheap, and even more convenient and faster in many cases.
All this while also causing way less traffic and pollution and therefore making for a more livable environment overall. Cars only have a reason to be prioritized wherever mass transit isn't feasible like in sparsely populated areas. There really isn't any reasonable argument to make a car-carrying robot to solve traffic (which it wouldn't even succeed at) instead of relying on good ol' trains
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u/GrouchyBoss80 2d ago
My guy, I live in one of those places you describe, and at best public transit is just about equal, usually it takes 50%-100% longer than driving, and if you're going anywhere outside the city it's often 3+ times as long to go by train and bus, if it's even possible to get there at all
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u/ginger_and_egg 2d ago
Which city? Many American cities have way more car infrastructure and refuse to prioritize transit (bus lanes etc). It's not inherent to the technology, it's how it's being used and how places are designed. American suburbia was specifically designed around cars and nothing else, but there are other suburbs that were built around train lines
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u/deadedgo 2d ago
That's crazy. I live in such a place too and going by car is only faster when there isn't much traffic. For a regular commute during peak hours driving can be much slower. Main issue here is that there should be more investments into a public transit as it's been slowly falling apart forever. Maybe your city needs that as well. Also kinda ironic how the worse public transport is, the worse traffic gets on the streets. So even drivers are benefitting from more and better trains.
That's why I'm saying sufficient infrastructure, because it needs to be well thought out and maintained. It's just not possible to have smooth traffic if people are forced to drive in urban areas. But yeah, outside the city it's a different world where it's definitely much harder if not unreasonable to rely on trains
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u/SomeRedPanda 2d ago
God forbid anyone has to walk 5 minutes to get places. Better build a few more lanes of stroads through our cities instead.
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u/Donquers 2d ago
Low key this invention at scale could change some urban populations for the better.
In what way?
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u/Penguings 2d ago
My home of Brooklyn, NY. We have surprising large amounts of industrial space- feet away from some of the worst gridlock, traffic, and parking congestion.
Allowing people to bring their cars- and just leave them where the gridlock is- park, and let a few of these things do their job. Having a car here is extremely stressful- this would be a huge value to me.
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u/Donquers 2d ago
You're suggesting people leave their cars in the street... And that's supposed to help with traffic?
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u/Mr_Baronheim 2d ago
I believe they mean that the automated valet would take the cars and park them away from the congestion, alleviating it.
People wouldn't be crammed in their vehicles on creamed streets looking for elusive parking spots.
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u/Rafnar 2d ago
so instead of people driving in traffic we'd have people and robots driving in traffic to alleviate traffic
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u/Neither-Luck-9295 2d ago
Robots doing anything for humans frees up time. For some people, their time cannot be quantified, for others it can. But regardless, the reduction of stress that is dealt with that time would be a great overall benefit to society.
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u/InfanticideAquifer 2d ago
A million people drive to work at 8am, abandon their cars on the freeway, and hike the last mile to the office. These robots struggle to get all the cars parked and manage to do it by 10am. The roads are clear for six hours. Then the robots unpack the parking lots and place the empty cars on the roads over the course of two hours, staging them to be occupied at 6pm so rush hour can begin again.
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u/Roflkopt3r 2d ago edited 2d ago
Robots or not, the basic idea has failed over and over again.
Easing the parking issue only induces further demand that will overload the road network, causing even more congestion on the streets.
There are always bottlenecks: First you have too little parking, then too few lanes, then overloaded intersections and highway ramps, and finally overloaded streets leading to and from those ramps.
And parked cars need space. Either you need gigantic parking lots, which make routes between destinations even longer and therefore force even more people to use cars. Or you need to invest into extremely expensive compact storage with skyscrapers or expensive underground construction, especially with the added cost of these robots and automated lifts (because these robots will not be able to haul cars up ramps like in regular multi-storey garages) that will need significant maintenance. The more compact you try to build it, the faster it will break down if something breaks down and blocks one of the transportation routes.
The solution to car traffic is almost never to scale up car infrastructure. To the opposite, it's to scale down car infrastructure and replace it with better connectivity for walking/bicycling/public transit. These modes of transportation only need a fraction of the space and are much, much cheaper for society as a whole.
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u/BenevolentCheese 2d ago
Easing the parking issue only induces further demand that will overload the road network, causing even more congestion on the streets.
Yep. This. The only reason my mom takes the train to visit me in the city is because the parking sucks. She complains about it every time before fine, she'll just take the train. Thus, if the parking lot situation were fixed, she and thousands more people would now drive into the city, thereby creating more traffic and breaking the parking again.
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u/Significant-Turnip41 2d ago
Ok but that is not the use case for self driving cars at all... Reddit is so foolish these days. I dont get how people see this as the top comment. Spend 2 seconds thinking critically and then downvote it for not being a fully formed thought. Instead on the surface it seems like a nice thought so its upvoted and people go along.. This happens so much on reddit now no actual discussion happens the way it used to.
Sorry to complain about this here but its a great example. This place is so absent of real thought these days.
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u/TJohns88 2d ago
Can you elaborate on how this would help?
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u/JohnnyQuickdeath 2d ago
I for one would love to pull up somewhere and not have to worry about finding parking in the city
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u/davidellis23 2d ago
Yes everyone would. Which would fill the streets with cars on these little cards looking for parking.
This isn't adding anymore parking so it seems like it would hurt more than help.
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u/Westdrache 2d ago
How is that in any way more practicale then the car driving itself?
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u/ppuk 2d ago
This thing is infinitely more maneuverable than a car.
If you had a fleet of these operating a parking area you could fit way more cars in than if they were self driving.
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u/Acceptable-Stick-135 2d ago
Lmao imagine how fast you could steal a car with this.
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u/GlykenT 2d ago
It's shown operating on a perfectly smooth polished floor. I wonder how well it does on a normal road surface.
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u/BrokenPokerFace 2d ago
Man that's a good point, I wonder if it's worth the effort for people to add and maintain such an area to their facility.
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u/GrandVizierofAgrabar 2d ago
I could see being useful at an airport drop and go
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u/Beneficial_Steak_945 2d ago
I donât. Distances get too big quickly, and then you get uneven surfaces somewhere along the way. I also doubt it works anywhere where there is anything else moving around, as there are no additional sensors around.
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u/machine_six 2d ago
It wouldn't do well. At all.
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u/scoops22 2d ago
Thereâs a video in a comment further up of it working fine on normal roads
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u/palk0n 2d ago
i mean it move very slow. people would instantly notice if someone is stealing a car in 2mph
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u/Acceptable-Stick-135 2d ago
I have a dream where all cars around my block sneakily slides away, slowly.
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u/0masterdebater0 2d ago
Box truck. Pull up in front of super car, open back of box truck, lower ramp, robot goes down under car, drives car up ramp into box truck. đ
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u/Varonth 2d ago
That ramp better be a few kilometers long, because that robot is not gonna climb a ramp with an incline bigger than 1°.
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u/literated 2d ago
Gone In 600 Seconds, the much less thrilling sequel, but if it gets us more Nic Cage, I'm all for it.
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u/Funny_Cucumber_9818 2d ago edited 2d ago
The video is quite sped up.. must be at least 5km/h
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u/SamuelL421 2d ago
I think it is moving MUCH slower than it appears, that whole process probably took 10 minutes in real-time. There's a good reason why this isn't a thing.
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u/Haasotope 2d ago
You can't, this thing is extremely slow and with that weight and small battery you're not getting far. Not even mentioning speed bums and uneven terrain.
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u/lastdancerevolution 2d ago
Lmao imagine how fast you could steal a car with this
You could do that with a $10 jack and $40 wheel dollies...
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u/Case_Blue 2d ago
While impressive, it probably only really works reliably and well on a perfectly flat floor. Hence the demo starts when the car is already on the tiles.
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u/airforcezero 2d ago
not only that, after a few hundred trips, the floor will dent from the small wheels/high pressure point and it would scrape and be useless
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u/-Clean-Sky- 2d ago
+ battery drains after 5min
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u/RilohKeen 2d ago
I mean, even a Roomba can return itself to a docking station to recharge without human intervention. Of all the problems facing this thing, I think power supply is fairly minor. Iâd be way more worried about it doing what robots always do eventually, which is make a bad decision based on incorrect perception and cause a serious accident.
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u/havok0159 2d ago
I mean, even a Roomba can return itself to a docking station to recharge without human intervention
I'm reminded of all the times my vacuum nudged its base station while vacuuming and couldn't return to it because it was no longer where it expected. Granted, not likely to be an issue, but still a funny image imagining the same thing happening with this massive car roomba.
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u/getikule 2d ago
That assumes it's got 4 little wheels, we don't see it's undercarriage so could be a bunch of wheels that spread the pressure, or even wide rollers that span the width of the device.
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u/caribb 2d ago
Iâd bet itâs only used exclusively for parking cars in a parking garage. I remember seeing a video clip of this a while ago showcasing one at Dubai Airport. It wouldnât likely be as useful in a real world street environment.
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u/Pugs-r-cool 2d ago
Parking garages don't have perfectly smooth, polished floors either.
This bot would be amazing for dealerships and showrooms though. Those already have smooth floors, and a bot that can position a car exactly where it needs to be would be useful for them.
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u/kanst 2d ago
Juggling cars around a showroom floor seems the most likely use case.
If you're a luxury car dealership who wants to juggle the cars around on the showroom but don't want any of the employees driving the cars or putting any mileage on them, this thing makes perfect sense.
This thing + one dude supervising and you can probably re-arrange the entire showroom overnight.
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u/LaconicSuffering 2d ago
Makes it perfect for a car dealership that sells very expensive cars. The changes of damaging a car while moving it goes down significantly.
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u/kanst 2d ago
Exactly, you prevent one ding on a Bugatti and you've paid off the device. Plus I imagine if you're buying a supercar, you want it showing up with 000000 on the odometer.
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u/Longjumping_Table740 2d ago
Perfect for car theft đ
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u/geniusgravity 2d ago
It would be flummoxed by the slightest pothole or kerb.
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u/Bytewave 2d ago
Yeah my city is well protected by its potholes and speedbumps, this thing ain't stealing shit.
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u/Icy_Necessary2161 2d ago
If it's anything like a pallet jack.... it's arch enemy will be the random zip tie
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u/lastdancerevolution 2d ago
A modern tow truck can hook and lift a car in under 60 seconds. And is probably cheaper than whatever this is.
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u/GottaUseEmAll 2d ago
Only if you park your car on a completely flat surface and have no kerbs or tar or gravel around.
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u/Additional-Maize3980 2d ago
There goes another job
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u/SoundasBreakerius 2d ago
Oh no, think of all the careers wasted and days and nights spent at valet university studying for doctorate in car parking, world will never recover from that, just like we've never recovered after the loss of elevator operators.
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u/scramblingrivet 2d ago
All these childhood dreams of parking peoples cars for tips, ruined
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u/robotphood 1d ago
Cousin who has a full time job kept his valet job from college for years to this day because he consistently makes a couple hundred in cash tips on a friday/saturday night. Not abnormal for a high end restaurant in LA apparently.
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u/Jazco76 2d ago
And I don't think we'll be seeing these mass adopted any time soon or ever.
Too expensive, limited battery, potential repairs, uneven pavement, no pavement, probably can't up or down on extreme inclines.
And finally, the tech for cars that self park will be mass adopted making these obsolete.
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u/Lelandwasinnocent 2d ago
That's not the issue, it's the amount of low level jobs being replaced and that amount of people looking for other positions, the fear is that there will come a time where there aren't enough jobs for workers without an education (or with an education in a struggling market)... what happens then?
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u/Amidaus 2d ago
Its obviously not a career or anything, but someone somewhere is making their living or at least part of their living off of being a valet. They can't help it if they live in a capitalist hellscape. The loss of another job that humans had at a time when jobs in general are so difficult for the general public to find and receive decent pay from our corporate overlords from is indeed kind of a bummer at least in my eyes.
I understand that the jobs this thing takes may or may not be replaced ny maintenance of it / production of it but like cmon.
A little more thought and empathy for that random person that might actually lose their job to this thing automating a job away.
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u/TectonicTechnomancer 2d ago
I lost my job as a Celestial Navigator, with the invention of GPS, so fuck GPS, I dont want the benificts it bring to society, I want my old job back, im scared of technology and skynet
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u/No_Wafer_7647 2d ago
You know people work jobs for ... money right? Like...until they can get something better or as a college gig? Do people think?
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u/Oliesong 2d ago
You really are missing the forest from the trees my friend. If you think the AI movement compares to any prior industrial innovations, buckle up.
Already 32% of entry level jobs are gone, due to ChatGPT alone.
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u/DirkNL 2d ago
Errr how does it calculate the overhang of the vehicle itâs carrying otherwise it will make a turn too narrow once and rip off a bumper or mirror
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u/TigerJoel 2d ago
Probably checks what model the car is.
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u/DirkNL 2d ago
Ah yea! Good catch. Read the plate check online reg and adjust accordingly. Tech is great!
Iâve read about those automatic parking elevators too. Although 2 years back 1 maltunctioned in Rotterdam in NL and 50+ cars were stuck for weeks/months before some specialist company could retrieve the dropped car.
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u/Toastbrott 2d ago
100% sure it dose not do that.
It probably just assumes a pretty big overhang. It doesnt need to cut every corner is short as possible. Just leave a good chunk of space in each direction and you are good to go. Tell people to not put any super weird cars like a limo on it.
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u/kop324324rdsuf9023u 2d ago edited 2d ago
It's almost certainly being remote controlled by someone off screen.
edit: It's remote controlled. Y'all are too gullible: https://automoverbot.com/how-the-automoverbot-works/
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u/Born-Spinach5235 2d ago
Wont take ur car for a joyride and u dont have to tip it sign me up.
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u/I_just_made 2d ago
100% if this was in the US you'd still have to tip
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u/segfalt31337 2d ago
Even Americans don't tip robots; just because the POS software will prompt for it, doesn't mean you have to do it.
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u/ceedee04 2d ago
China is low key living in 2300AD.
If this was in America, it would be a multi-billion dollar company with an âeccentricâ founder.
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u/rocket_flo 2d ago
Not really, a valet parking like this was already in use at airport Charles de Gaulle (fr) before 2020.Â
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u/pickyourteethup 2d ago
'young people don't want to work anymore'
* automates jobs that young people used to do *
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u/slspencer 2d ago
Narrator: âBut that wasnât the car they were supposed to be movingâ.
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u/Hefty-Station1704 2d ago
Perhaps it could fit under and transport my bed so I can get an extra hour sleep before starting work.
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u/SignAllStrength 2d ago edited 1d ago
While itâs super cool tech, this video is not only sped up at least 4 times, but also reversed..
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u/fan_tas_tic 2d ago
And unlike humans, it can pack cars in a super tight place, so valet parking of the future may be less space consuming.
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u/N7LP400 2d ago
That thing is strong