| ▲ | pontus 4 hours ago |
| So I'll have to park my car in a garage first, then take a bus to the terminal just so that a robot can move my car from the place where I parked it to a different place? I was hoping it'd be something where I'd pull up to the curb, grab my bags and head in while the robot parked the car for me but apparently I'll still have to take a bus to the terminal? |
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| ▲ | dom96 4 minutes ago | parent | next [-] |
| Meanwhile their toilets are all completely down because of water supply failures[1]. A sad and funny juxtaposition. 1 - https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/jul/26/water-supply... |
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| ▲ | simonklee 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Exactly, i think this product is solving an airport problem and not a user problem. Whenever i park at an airport i always look for the shortest distance to terminal / price, then chose an option that lands within an acceptable range. Unless i'm way for very long shuttle-bus isn't really on the table. |
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| ▲ | telesilla 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Sometimes airport parking is insanely expensive (cough Schipol), so I'll park further away anyway or park somewhere I can get the train. If this helped lower costs I'd be fine with this but probably they'd keep the high price anyway. | | |
| ▲ | nextos an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | Gatwick long-term parking is not expensive if you book in advance. You need to take a slow bus shuttle to the terminal, but it's never more than 15-20 min including waiting time. I've used it a zillion times as I'd rather not give my keys to those meet & greet companies who drive your car 5 miles. It might void insurance and waiting times when you return tend to be over an hour. | |
| ▲ | myegorov 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Fun fact: you can get to/from Schiphol by bike. | | |
| ▲ | usrnm 4 minutes ago | parent | next [-] | | Some time ago I would've considered that a joke, but this year NS has been about as reliable as DB, so I might actually consider that option | |
| ▲ | Etheryte an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I mean, you can get to and from practically any airport by bike if you're determined enough. | | |
| ▲ | eptcyka 2 minutes ago | parent [-] | | World of difference between using cycling infrastructure and sharing roads with 2 ton beasts powered by paleo compost. |
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| ▲ | juleiie an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | Unless the bike has electric engine and cargo compartment it’s not super viable id say to move all that luggage | | |
| ▲ | aequitas an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | Maybe that’s why the “elektrische bakfiets” (electrified cargo bike) is really popular here in the Netherlands. I’ve got one and don’t even live anywhere near an airport, closest one is at least an hour by car. | | |
| ▲ | juleiie 25 minutes ago | parent [-] | | What about a sudden rainstorm on a bike? Or a heatwave without AC? The way I see it sure you can go everywhere using a less than ideal transport option and manage if you must. But.. why? | | |
| ▲ | yurishimo 9 minutes ago | parent | next [-] | | The Dutch have a saying, “Je bent niet van suiker” which means “You’re not made of sugar.” Rain here is a fact of life, similar to the UK or Vancouver, Orlando or the Amazon Rainforest. Everyone who uses a bike for transportation here has a good rain jacket. And to put things in perspective, the normal rain seen in the Netherlands is more of a light drizzle and it generally comes in fits and spurts as moist air is pushed inland from the ocean. If you can afford to wait an hour, the rain is probably stopped. Also, getting to the airport with a bike in the Netherlands is fine! There are nice protected bicycle lanes, a nice parking garage, good connections to neighboring infrastructure and you can always bring your bike down to the train platform if you need to go a bit further. When you live in a country that prioritizes cycling infrastructure, taking a bike is the practical, cheapest, and often fastest way to reach your destination. Now to end on a point of more agreement, I agree with you that the demonization of AC in much of Europe is silly. Nobody is upset that in Bangkok or Tokyo that every building has AC. For some reason a certain type of European just doesn’t want to adapt and they will fight tooth and nail to prevent others from utilizing their own economic means in order to stay comfortable in their own homes. My home has solar panels and during the summer they produce much more power than I can utilize at one given moment anyway so if I want to run my AC at 400W during the peak heatwave that should be of no concern to anyone. | |
| ▲ | Grombobulous 4 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | You’re right, it’s not ideal. That’s why people in the Netherlands invented a special technology to compensate, which they call “clothes.” | |
| ▲ | Aaargh20318 9 minutes ago | parent | prev [-] | | Like any Dutch mom would say to their kids complaining about cycling in bad weather: you’re not made of sugar are you? (Meaning: you won’t melt due to a bit of rain, quit being a pussy). |
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| ▲ | masklinn an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | Depends how much luggage exactly, but bakfiets and cargo trailers can be pretty roomy. Ebike is always helpful. And that's before you get into tricycles. |
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| ▲ | amelius 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | It's still an impressive engineering feat, and (probably, given recent AI advances) an incredible time to market. I wonder when they started working on this, how big their company is, how much training data they put into it, etc. What is the name of the company that built this? | | |
| ▲ | semiquaver 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > (probably, given recent AI advances) an incredible time to market
There’s nothing whatsoever to indicate that this has anything at all to do with LLMs. | |
| ▲ | wildzzz 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | It's probably got some AI but not the GPU gobbling kind. This is old school robotics using control loops and old AI algorithms. Sensors decide if you've parked correctly in the garage. Robot is dispatched via a queue once you've closed the door. Cameras and sensors guide the dolly into place. Robot follows predetermined route to the parking spot and uses sensors to detect obstructions (people, debris, other robots parking cars). Maybe there's lidar on board. Cameras and encoders guide the car perfectly into the designated spot. Robot whisks off to go charge or grab another car from the queue. It's effectively the same level of intelligence as a Roomba with the mechanics of an electric forklift. It's still cool but the fundamentals were developed 40+ years ago, we've just managed to shrink a lot of the tech down in size and power since then. | |
| ▲ | SoftTalker 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I parked in a robotic parking garage in Denmark ten years ago. This isn't really new tech, though the implementation sounds a bit different. | | | |
| ▲ | domh 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | It says Stanley Robotics in the article: https://www.stanley-robotics.com/ Edit: seems like they got bought out in 2024 by HL Robotics: https://en.hlrobotics.co.kr/ | |
| ▲ | mschuster91 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | > how much training data they put into it This kind of stuff has been the norm literally for decades in any major harbor. No AI BS needed. | | |
| ▲ | kkrkgbbsvjdlzn 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | We had AI in the 80/90s, we even had an AI hype in the 80/90s. | | |
| ▲ | shermantanktop an hour ago | parent [-] | | The things we called AI back then would not get that label today. Maybe “decision tree” or “expert system”? Or simply “algorithm”? | | |
| ▲ | w4der a few seconds ago | parent [-] | | And I bet even current LLMs will get relabeled as not-AI once the next best thing comes around in a decade or less. |
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| ▲ | wat10000 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Isn't this just automated valet parking? Valet parking allows more efficient use of space, which makes it cheaper in places where space is at a premium. Automating it would change that tradeoff in a way that benefits the customer. | | |
| ▲ | bravoetch 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | It's missing the value-add of valet parking - being able to pull up at the front door and walk away from your car. Without that, this is not valet anything. You still park then shuttle to the airport so there's zero benefit to the end user. | | |
| ▲ | myself248 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | On the other hand, it leaves the car locked the whole time, no valet having your keys, no valet adjusting your seats, etc. Some of us avoid valet for some of these reasons. If this thing could pick up my car from curbside at arrivals dropoff like a valet, but handle it robotically so there's no valet downside, it would be amazing. | | |
| ▲ | grogenaut an hour ago | parent [-] | | on the other other hand it randomly pressure points the bottom of your car on points that weren't really meant for it. agree that this would be way better if you just drove up in a queue and cars were taken away. one imagines the slow moving conveyors at amusement parks to get people closer to the ride's speed, tho given how long people take to park, get, take off the seat belt, find park, shut off the car, check their faces in the mirror, Find their cell, button their jacket, straighten up other stuff, find the rest of their shit, get out of the car, kiss their loved ones for 10 straight minutes, struggle with the tailgate, get their bats out, realize they forgot their phone, and finally head away from their car... probbably wouldn't work. I see people take 5 minutes to get their car moving or get out at a grocery store. what they're doing I'll never guess. Car isn't even started for 3 minutes. When I first learned to drive my dad's hard and fast rule was to get the A/C running before anything else (other than insuring the car wouldn't move), the windows could be lowered with your other hand as a secondary. | | |
| ▲ | clort an hour ago | parent [-] | | it picks it up by the tyres, so no random pressure points |
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| ▲ | wat10000 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | In some places, it's no more convenient, and the value-add is just that you can pack cars in tighter. In Manhattan, for example, it's common for valet parking to be cheaper and less convenient. |
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| ▲ | varispeed 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | I look for most spacious parking place with wide approach lanes, then shortest distance. Some car parks at the airports are just ridiculous. So narrow you can't exit the car. | | |
| ▲ | kkrkgbbsvjdlzn 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | I you have an extreme size SUV, yes, it should be hard to park. It’s by design. | | |
| ▲ | varispeed 3 minutes ago | parent | next [-] | | I don't have a SUV. But why it should be hard? Do you hate people? | |
| ▲ | close04 41 minutes ago | parent | prev [-] | | I have a small car (regular hatchback) and a lot of the parking spots in the very large airport in my city are just marginally wider than my car. If you can’t get the spot at the end of the row, the only way to park in some of the buildings is to offload all your passengers, hope you find a spot where you can park “right door to right door” next to someone else so you can leave just enough room on the left side to squeeze out. The parking buildings were built when cars were smaller than small cars today, and as the passenger count increased, so did the need for more spots, in a 0 sum game. They just split the cake in smaller slices. |
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| ▲ | clickety_clack 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Implementation is everything. If there’s enough capacity to drive up and drop your car off without queueing, and your car is ready to go as you leave the terminal then it sounds great. If there’s a half hour wait to get into the drop off zone, and another half hour wait after picking up your bags, and a half hour walk to the pickup/dropoff area then I’d prefer a 30 min shuttle. |
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| ▲ | iamben 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| I think this is solving the 'airport parking' problem my dad has. He drives to the airport, parks a mile or so away in some field and the company that owns the field drops him off at the terminal. He can leave his car there for the week. This feels like a clever solution to have some spaces closer to the airport and many spaces further away. |
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| ▲ | atmosx an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Well that’s the design / usability / real needs part. Which is what these projects often miss. I see often tech replacing parts of a workflow but in reality the process / flow remains the same. Now some parts are digital and we call this “progress”. Strictly speaking it’s digitization but not progress. |
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| ▲ | INTPenis 24 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| It's basically a larger version of P-Snurran they made in Stockholm back in 2023. It was like a CD changer for cars. |
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| ▲ | Reason077 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Yes, it doesn't make a lot of sense if you can't pull up close to the terminal and leave your car there for the robot to park. But I assume this is just a prototype/trial of the robot tech with a view to expanding it in the future. Presumably they didn't want the risk of broken down (or stuck/confused) parking robots clogging up the busy airport drop off area. |
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| ▲ | ghm2199 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Not a problem for me, :) I always take a shuttle or an Uber to the airport from where I parked, which is 10-15 mins away, because parking at the airport(JFK, LaGuardia, Newark at least) is stupid expensive The article says: > The facility is within walking distance of the South Terminal, although a free shuttle bus is also available. |
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| ▲ | have_faith 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Article says one of the terminals is within walking distance |
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| ▲ | IshKebab 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | Anything is within walking distance if you're willing to walk... Anyway here's where it is: https://maps.app.goo.gl/YZKPXp7LSjc5jPot5 Turn on satellite view and you can see it is on the edge of the long stay parking. I dunno if you're realistically going to save a lot of time unless your parking space is right at the back of the long stay car park. Worth it if it's free! I assume it's overpriced though. | | |
| ▲ | kkotak 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | From the map. It looks like the train is closer to the terminal :) | | |
| ▲ | IshKebab an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | Yes if you can get a train into a UK airport that's definitely the way, but even in the train-friendly UK that's often not feasible. For example Bristol airport has no railway. Heathrow is very inaccessible by train from the west. So there are unfortunately still plenty of reasons to drive to UK airports. | |
| ▲ | kkrkgbbsvjdlzn 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | [flagged] |
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| ▲ | mattlutze 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Think of it as picking the parking garage or lot you like, but skipping the hunt for an open spot. As these things go, if the service provider is able to make step one work and the airport continues the partnership, an eventual step would indeed be coming closer to or at the terminal, and the robot scooters (sounds a little like scaled-up warehouse robots) would move the car to storage. |
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| ▲ | the__alchemist 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| I will give you a reason why this might be useful. Not at Gatwick. (I always took the train when I lived in that area and usually ended up at Heathrow or Stanstead anyway). But at Raleigh NC for example, you have to go up 5 levels to find a spot, (I have never seen an open spot on levels 1-4) and spend about 10 minutes or more finding a spot after that, then walking from your spot to the elevator, then back out. Or sometimes the lot is filled up, and you have to drive to a lot far away, then spend even longer finding a spot that will be at the far end of the lot, then walking a good distance to the bus terminal. That's if you know the system, and are aware that you won't find spots on the lower levels, and that the "x spots open" indicators are lying. If you're new, you can spend 30+ minutes on a goose chase, miss your flight etc. This solves that problem; not the bus one. (If the drop-off location is easy to access; if not, then it's pointless) |
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| ▲ | Reason077 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | > "you won't find spots on the lower levels, ... the "x spots open" indicators are lying" A simpler and cheaper solution would be to fix those availability signs. Surely this is not a problem that a few cameras and some smart software couldn't solve. | | |
| ▲ | iamtheworstdev 10 minutes ago | parent [-] | | Atlanta/Hartsfield just opened a new parking deck with those cameras and I bet some fancy as f### AI powered system. 7 level deck, I tried 4 of them before I realized the green/red lights were just randomly switching back in forth, so the total on each floor never reached zero. Fortunately, the top deck was free. When I got back I walked past the kiosk that said "type in your license plate and locate your car" for those who forgot where they parked, like I did. Typed it in - no car found. (this was a recent trip, out on 07/23 and back on 07/25) |
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| ▲ | 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
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| ▲ | globular-toast 22 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| It's more like valet parking except you lock your car and keep your keys. I guess enough people don't trust someone else driving their car. |
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| ▲ | mcfedr an hour ago | parent | prev [-] |
| especially disappointing as there is valet parking at Gatwick that works exactly like that |
