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Image courtesy of Engadget
A garage that parks your car kind of like I, Robot, minus the killer robots

AutoMotion Parking Systems has introduced its first fully robotic parking garage in New York.  The parking garage is now open for the residents at 123 Baxter Street, a newly developed condominium building.  The robotic parking system is using the technology developed by German-based industrial manufacturer, Stolzer Parkhaus.

Stolzer Parkhaus has already built 28 automated facilities in 11 countries.  The company in charge of managing the automated garage is MJS Garage Management.

According to The Auto Channel, this development of the automated parking garage will have a huge impact on the parking service industry in terms of jobs and reduction of property damage and theft.  With this new system, customers have no need to pay an attendant.  They just swipe a card, and the robotic system retrieves their vehicle in less than 2.5 minutes.

Mr. Michael Schneeweiss, President of MJS commented on the efficiency of the system. “I’ve never seen a parking system that works so efficiently. We’ve been to Germany and to Washington to see operational systems and are convinced this is the future of the parking industry in terms of reliability, safety, and convenience to the customer.”

Also, with this new system, theft will basically become obsolete.  With no attendants or valets, nobody enters the vehicle from the time the customer drops their car off to when they pick it up.

The driver enters the parking garage, swipes their card and leaves.  The car then is transported on a platform to its storage bay.  When the driver returns, they swipe their card and their car is retrieved.

The automated parking garage in New York will be able to house 67 vehicles.  The new system allows for more efficient space usage by eliminating the need for headroom and any other space consuming factors.  The system is also able to house all types of personal vehicles, from sport utility to sedans, with the exception of the largest of the SUVs.

German automaker BMW has signed a contract with AutoMotion Parking Systems, offering automobile servicing for any make and model.  BMW will pick up the vehicles from the parking garage, service them, and then return them.

According to Engadget, The service is going at a rate of $400 for a monthly pass or $25 for just one day.

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I-Robot
By TimberJon on 1/31/2007 11:58:54 AM , Rating: 2
My mouth was watering at the title. I-Robot came to mind with their sealed-revolving parking system thing. Nice that theyre making these though. Then someone else will think they have a better idea and improve upon the design. Hopefully we can see some competition and new auto-garage designs.




RE: I-Robot
By armagedon on 1/31/2007 12:23:25 PM , Rating: 1
yes a better idea is, use the public transportation system.


RE: I-Robot
By creathir on 1/31/2007 1:21:09 PM , Rating: 3
If I lived in Chicago or New York... sure, I would...
But for the rest of the country, public transportation is more of an inconvenience than a benefit. Most routes travel to a CBD (central business district) for outlaying parts of the city. (This is where public transportation makes the most sense.)

However, most of the country has... spread out. Large CBDs are really not growing very much, at least from a business perspective. Sure they are adding hotels and things like that, but it is more economical to develop along central corridors than down in a small, central area. Take Houston for instance... they do have a centralized downtown, but more and more "clusters" of skyscrapers are popping up all over the metropolitan area.

Public transportation is only an alternative, if it actually goes where you need it to go.

- Creathir


RE: I-Robot
By Souka on 1/31/2007 11:11:08 PM , Rating: 2
public trans...ugh.

I live 13 miles from Seattle.... but to take a bus to work requires 2 transfers and upto 1.5hrs time. If I drive, 15-30 mins depending on traffic.

I could cut time down to 50 mintues by driving part way to a park-n-ride, but that only saves me just a few mins and then my car is at a public facility all day getting door dings and prowled by car thiefs..... ugh...


parking garages could be put to good use in seattle... nice idea regardless....


RE: I-Robot
By SoCalBoomer on 1/31/2007 1:21:53 PM , Rating: 2
Yes - but one still needs a car in many areas (to visit parents in areas not serviced by public transportation, etc.) and this makes a good place to store one's vehicle whilst one is using public transportation.

;)


RE: I-Robot
By armagedon on 1/31/2007 3:41:30 PM , Rating: 2
sure you need cars sometime but those automated garage won't pop up in rural area. They are meant for densely populated area like downtown. So most of the time those locations "should" have efficient public transportation. But agreed it's not the case most of the time since all the money is spent on accommodating more and more cars to the point of strangling a city. But that's another story ...


RE: I-Robot
By fbxcore on 1/31/2007 6:00:37 PM , Rating: 2
Yeah, considering that your city has sufficient public transportation. My city has terrible public transportation, it's a pretty dense and populated city but the farthest we have in that area is a barebones bus system with not so many routes.


RE: I-Robot
By CrasHxxx on 2/2/2007 2:32:14 AM , Rating: 2
I have the same trouble with our transit system as well


Man vs. Machine
By borowki on 1/31/2007 10:46:33 AM , Rating: 2
This reminds me of the episode in Get a Life where Chris lost his job to a newspaper delivering robot. Parking attendants everywhere need to put on some tin-foil and do battle with the machines!




RE: Man vs. Machine
By bhieb on 1/31/2007 11:36:12 AM , Rating: 2
I-Robot here we come. Remember the giant rotating carosel of cars. Now if they would just drive themselves.


RE: Man vs. Machine
By FITCamaro on 1/31/07, Rating: 0
RE: Man vs. Machine
By moisiss on 1/31/2007 1:44:18 PM , Rating: 1
HAHA! Yeah... cars are too safe.... we should just go back to the dark ages before we had all this stupid technology that make our lives better/easier... man those were the days!

Personally, I can't wait for cars that drive themselves... there is so much good that could come out of it. The first (most obvious) thing that comes to mind is a 100% drop in drunk driving accidents... that's right 0 drunk driving accidents. You could go get as ripped as you want to, get in your car, and wake up when you get home (or the next morning depending on how blasted you really are). Or how about 0 accidents related to fatigue, or road rage, or just plain stupidity? That would be good right? Or, how great would it be, say on a long road trip, to get going around the time you would be going to bed? 12 hr drive?... no problem. Leave at 10pm, punch in your destination, and curl up and sleep most of the trip. When you wake up you would be mostly there, and if you still need to waste some time, pop in a movie or read a book. To me, that beats the hell out of driving for 12hrs. Think about how much you could get done in all that time you waste driving. To me that's not lazy, it's just smart.



RE: Man vs. Machine
By Chudilo on 2/1/2007 10:46:46 AM , Rating: 3
Actually Lexus now offers a car that can Park itself and that's one of the rather difficult maneuvers for a human driver.
In addition, it offers cruise control that can maintain a safe distance from a vehicle in front of you and decelerates / apply brakes all the way to a full stop, if the need arises(this option is available in a number of modern luxury Sedans, it's not even considered all that uncommon)

Infiniti is offering an unintentional Lane change warning that is able to see lanes.

Damler Chrysler is planing to release cars that "talk to each other" via WI-FI or similar technology. They are able to share traffic and other useful information.

And last but not least, Navigation systems are constantly getting cheaper and cheaper. I am willing to bet that within a few years you will see them as standard equipment on even budget oriented cars. Display and microchip technology is a point where they could stamp the whole navigation system into one chip plus the antenna that you already for satelite radio, and an a cheapo small LCD. Total cost about $50 to the consumer including the software and the data that is already available.

When the collection of all these systems become reliable and cheap enough to be included in budget oriented cars, and all cars become position "AWARE", and we all switch to Hydrogen, so much so, that Gasoline will be be difficult to come by and be considered an Archaic inefficient remnant of the Old, pre-environmentally friendly society, which will virtually eliminate non "position-aware" cars from the roads then we'll all be driven around in those Auto pilot cars that you're talking about.

Which may not be as distant of a future as you might think. Probably all during the course of our lifetime.
Unless of course they finally find Antigravity. Then this whole thing will happen a even faster, because the airways don't have to be shared with the Archaic technologies such as the Ones that Actually BURN natural resources.


RE: Man vs. Machine
By Gleep on 1/31/2007 2:29:58 PM , Rating: 2
Hulking steel vehicles with no seatbelts, anti-lock brakes, or air bags are death machines.

http://www.bts.gov/publications/national_transport...

The number of fatal accidents has hardly changed since 1960, yet the number of vehicles on the road and the number of miles driven has dramatically increased (718 thousand miles in 1960 vs 2.96 million miles in 2004). Fatalities per 100 million vehicle-miles has gone from 5.1 in 1960 to 1.4 in 2004.

Robot controlled cars would be much safer than human controlled cars, as it stands the percentage of non-driver caused accidents (mechanical failure) is miniscule. Imagine a world with 90% fewer accidents and better traffic flow. As much as I may enjoy driving I'm willing to give this up for a safer and easier driving experience. I can always go to a race track and have fun.


RE: Man vs. Machine
By goku on 1/31/2007 9:25:38 PM , Rating: 2
Naw, even better and more 'compliant' with 'older cars' would be to divide up the highway so that the inner two lanes would be for traffic going back and forth. Because the cars are automated, you can stick more cars closer together without an issue since braking distance could be calculated by the first car that brakes, it then sends a signal to all the other cars behind it to brake as well.

The main issue I see with automated driving would be the fact that it should be disabled in bad weather as I'd hope the driver would be better able to handle it.


RE: Man vs. Machine
By Canadian Eurasian on 1/31/2007 2:44:12 PM , Rating: 1
I have to agree with FITCamaro... Cars are too safe these days. People have this (at least somewhat) false sense of security due to all this fabulous technology, and as a consequence they don't respect driving as much as they should. So they take more risks than they normally would. Like driving without a seatbelt with the rationale that their airbag will save them. Thats just one example...

I know I read an article about a month ago about how this European city did this experiment where they removed a lot of their street signs and accidents actually decreased due to people having to pay more attention. Sorry... couldn't find any links.

New and advanced technology isn't as great as people think it is. The only thing that can save us IS us.


RE: Man vs. Machine
By Homerboy on 1/31/2007 12:31:27 PM , Rating: 1
wowie-wow!
somebody that knows Get a Life!!!! One of the greatest shows ever!


The future of city parking
By psychobriggsy on 1/31/2007 10:48:09 AM , Rating: 2
These garages are pretty awesome for how compact they are, and the various forms they come in. The other benefits mentioned are also attractive.

Not cheap though, but considering the value of the land they're built on... and the value of the vehicles stored inside I guess!




RE: The future of city parking
By AnotherGuy on 1/31/2007 11:04:55 AM , Rating: 2
I think this is pretty cheap for NY.... Other parking garages charge you about $30-40 a day


RE: The future of city parking
By Myrandex on 1/31/2007 1:10:27 PM , Rating: 2
My favorite thing is the safety. When I park my truck in a garage (especially on the end of a row) I am always afraid some moron will come around too fast and clip it. It has been hit 2 or 3 times in garages since I bought it, and when no evidence or cameras there is no way to pursue the culprit. This would also eliminating the dooshbags that can't understand how to color inbetween the lines, much less park inbetween them.
Jason


By isaacmacdonald on 1/31/2007 3:28:43 PM , Rating: 2
Actually it's quite reasonable priced. Lots of the places downtown charge around $15-$20/hr during the day. I don't know how much it costs to rent a normal parking spot, but I'd be surprised if it were any cheaper. Also, with this system there's a greater sense of security because no one else gets to enter your car.

I like it!


RE: The future of city parking
By bottle23 on 1/31/2007 5:19:07 PM , Rating: 2
But don't they do this in Japan already?


RE: The future of city parking
By xelpmoc on 2/1/2007 2:15:09 AM , Rating: 2
Yeah, Japan has had garages like this for a while.


By otispunkmeyer on 2/1/2007 4:17:59 AM , Rating: 2
considering the amount of land they dont have in japan, and how densely populated things are in the cities, making things as compact as you can is the only way to make best use of the little space they have.

they must of had them for a while mind, i remember watching Jeremy Clarksons motorworld (which is a early to mid 90's series) and he went to japan and he showed a automated parking garage in action, so they must of had them for over 10 years at least


More challenge for hackers.
By armagedon on 1/31/2007 11:15:52 AM , Rating: 2
it surely computerize, so someone could eventually trick the system and get another car of it's choice... You pull in an old VW and get a fresh BMW. I like that.




RE: More challenge for hackers.
By lazyinjin on 1/31/2007 11:29:38 AM , Rating: 3
I'm sure that possible, but you won't have the keys! A big flaw with valet parking is you leave them the keys and they put a bunch of miles on ur dad's Ferrari(Ferris Bueller's Day Off.... anyone?) I hate the idea of giving someone else my car to drive, this seems like a good solution to that.


RE: More challenge for hackers.
By nerdboy on 1/31/2007 12:31:55 PM , Rating: 1
quote:
Ferris Bueller's Day Off.... anyone?


Nice


RE: More challenge for hackers.
By Chernobyl68 on 1/31/2007 6:26:45 PM , Rating: 2
"HI. You speak English?"

"What country do you think this is?"

love that movie!


kind of like I, Robot, minus the robots
By AfroTrance on 1/31/2007 8:52:23 PM , Rating: 2
Where's the robot?

So an automated conveyor belt is a robot now?




RE: kind of like I, Robot, minus the robots
By Oregonian2 on 1/31/2007 9:03:17 PM , Rating: 2
Yes, most robots don't have heads, hands, eyes, and the like. That's only in movies. Real robots look like belts and the like.



RE: kind of like I, Robot, minus the robots
By AfroTrance on 2/1/2007 9:33:14 AM , Rating: 2
So an escalator is a robot? Or an automated glass door? And it was this blog that mentioned a movie about a bunch of humanoid robots. (and strangely not the book it was based on... considering this is a geek website)


By dice1111 on 2/1/2007 10:22:10 AM , Rating: 2
Sure, any machinery that is controlled by a central processing unit of some type can be considered a robot. Robots physical appearance is only determined by the job it is to perform and the money invested into it.

In the real world fancy "human like" robots are non-existent. What manufacture/company would pay for those kind of cosmetics? It would be senseless.

Human like robots can only be remotely considered by home consumers who are the ONLY people who care about what a thing looks like over its functionality. But the market isn’t ready for anything of the like. The tech isn’t there and neither is the cost. Plus, you’d have to be nerdy like us to actually be able to use an in house robot.

On top of that, would the hot girl next door be more impressed with you new corvette, or your new automated maid that looks like it was form the movie Runaway (if anyone is old enough to even remember that movie)? http://imdb.com/title/tt0088024/ (imdb.com)

I got myself the car! ...and I'll park it in this garage!


artwork
By andrewapold on 1/31/2007 10:36:37 AM , Rating: 1
I love the nice artwork they have on the wall for your car while it sits in storage.




RE: artwork
By fcx56 on 1/31/2007 11:31:51 AM , Rating: 2
It looks to me like that's where you drop off your car, and it's then transported to the storage bay


RE: artwork
By Captain Orgazmo on 1/31/2007 12:52:07 PM , Rating: 4
Forget the artwork: while your beamer is in storage, a female robotic parking attendant polishes its shifter knob, and exchanges lubricants with it. Kind of like brothel for cars.


RE: artwork
By Jaylllo on 1/31/07, Rating: -1
Redundancy?
By peldor on 1/31/2007 11:40:10 AM , Rating: 4
So what happens when (not if) it breaks? Can you retrieve it any other way?




RE: Redundancy?
By Lonearchon on 1/31/2007 1:29:22 PM , Rating: 2
Most likely there is some redundancy build in like multiple robot units inside so when one breaks the other could take over. The cars are store on simple racks with the robot to place the car on and take it off


I found better system than Robotic Parking
By Goodidea on 2/2/2007 9:55:15 AM , Rating: 2
I really think it is good idea to install automatic parking system. That way they can place more parking spaces within the same sized land area when compared to conventional parking. It also brings several advantages such as cost reduction in both construction and operation, time saving from convenience of unnecessary search for parking space, maximum security from car theft and vandalism, environmental friendly and free from door dings and car damages.

There is company called MP System www.mp-parking.com and they are very different from other ordinary automatic parking (such as pallet system) This company has better system than Pallet system (We all know pallet system dropped several cars and it is not because of computer glitch) MP system has less complicated parking and retrieving procedures, all fixed structures and all parking spaces with no moving part whereas a parking spaces and structure in Pallet type system consist of all types of moving parts such as rollers, rubber bands, gears, pallets and more and MP System can directly park a car utilizing building structure whereas Pallet type system requires its own additional steel structure for each spaces, which consequently creates cost overlapping.

I believe we are heading to 21st century and more people are purchasing vehicles. I mean this is going to be future parking and I don’t see why they shouldn’t use it.




By robot master on 2/2/2007 10:24:58 AM , Rating: 2
I agree with you. Pallet system has some problem. For example one in Hoboken, I read the news the other day it says
"At the nation's first such fully computerized parking garage, built in 2002 across the river in Hoboken, N.J., the computer dropped an unoccupied Cadillac Deville six floors in 2004 and a Jeep four stories the following year. Early last year, a computer glitch trapped cars inside the over-sized vending machine for just over 26 hours..."

I also checked this MP system website and it looks so simply and like you said there is not much moving park because they are fixed onto concrete and since they don't need steel structure it will cost much cheaper.
Wow I thought Robotic parking is the only one out there but I guess not huh! It also looks like they are installing their system to China, Turkey, Spain, Hungary, India and U.A.E. except U.S. If U.S. wants to bring automatic parking system why not they bring the BEST!!!!!!!


By NONative on 2/2/2007 1:20:01 PM , Rating: 2
I've read a lot about Robotic Parking’s Hoboken system. What a mess! While I fully support this technology, you wouldn't find my car there.

Like in all things, it’s usually the simplest systems that succeed in the market - that’s how it works. While the rest of the world is years ahead of us on automatic parking, let's hope competition from companies like MP will smooth out the kinks.


Yeah, RIGHT!
By mindless1 on 1/31/2007 5:10:14 PM , Rating: 2
"theft will basically become obsolete. With no attendants or valets,..."

Leet haxxors will just have all the cars delivered to them with nobody to know it's not theirs.




RE: Yeah, RIGHT!
By marvdmartian on 2/1/2007 9:12:31 AM , Rating: 2
Well, as was pointed out above, with the ever increasing use of chipped keys, it's not going to do you much good to get the car by hacking the system, if you don't have the keys to drive it off immediately. Remember, stall a thief for 30 seconds, and he'll usually move off to more lucrative (and easy) pickin's.

What I can see, though, is hackers messing with the system so that either you get the wrong vehicle when you swipe your card, or that the system sits there and parks every car in the same stall.....depending on what interlocks it has, and how strong the system is, you could potentially start pushing cars out of a brand new hole in the side of the garage! ;)


Inside men are the weakness
By spindoc on 1/31/2007 6:05:22 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
German automaker BMW has signed a contract with AutoMotion Parking Systems, offering automobile servicing for any make and model. BMW will pick up the vehicles from the parking garage, service them, and then return them.


Forget about hacking the system. This is the most obvious security risk. So now instead of trusting a valet to drive your car for two minutes to and from the parking space you're trusting a mechanic to drive your car to the dealer for maintenance without getting it dirty, damaging it or stealing it.

I say "I think not"




RE: Inside men are the weakness
By Xenoid on 1/31/2007 8:35:05 PM , Rating: 2
The people in the BMW service department are required to be rather professional in comparison with a regular/scammy service shop.

I guess that only happens if you drive an E90 though because they sure treat me like shit (E36).


Cool
By 05SilverGT on 1/31/2007 10:44:10 AM , Rating: 2
I'd trust this over parking valet parking. Some of those guys/gals shouldn't be allowed to touch peoples cars. As long as there some kind of insurance provided if your car is damaged I'm in.




By bespoke on 1/31/2007 2:01:24 PM , Rating: 2
http://www.drivelineblog.com/?p=61

It's a 20 story tower filled with new Volkswagens - not so much a garage as it is storage for newly minted autos.

Vee-dub in da house!




By jpg on 1/31/2007 5:02:48 PM , Rating: 2
...the end of "parking guy" B.O.!

When I ask for my car back at some valet parking place the first thing in my mind is: "please, oh Almighty, let my car come back the same way it was" and in second place: "please, oh Almighty, let the guy driving it be the one that showers regularly"




Too expensive!
By AlmostExAMD on 2/1/2007 4:42:35 AM , Rating: 1
That is over a weeks wage for most of us(Blue collar), No thanks!
Great idea for people living/working in the city on a decent wage though, $400 a month no way, $40 yes please!




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