Two years ago we discussed in detail when autonomous vehicles would be commercially available. Wags from silicon valley said, “just around the corner” or “just over the horizon.” The inference being within the next decade, certainly. That was in 2017. I was a tad more jaundiced. I predicted 30 years or more.
Remember, autonomous vehicles that threaten the parking industry must be level five, all singing and dancing cars that will go anywhere in any weather. My prediction was that the first vehicles that were level five would be taxis (or Uber/lyft), commercial vehicles (long haul trucks and delivery vehicles), and buses/shuttles. That made sense to me because the investment in level 5 will be horrendous and the commercial benefit to these companies (removing the single largest expense, the driver) is obvious.
Over on Parknews.biz Astrid posted an article about Hyundai and Kia and their EV charging and auto valet parked cars. The idea is that you would drop off your EV in front of the parking garage, it would park itself and if needed charging, would be parked in a ‘charging slot’. When charged it would automatically be moved to another spot, allowing another EV space for charging. When you wanted the car, you would call it on your smart phone and it would drive to your location. Super.
Hyundai, in the article, expects this to be running by 2025 and commercially available by 2030. They acknowledge this is a level 4 vehicle. So lets see. Industry is projecting a level 4 vehicle 13 years from my discussions in 2017. And remember, these vehicles will need garages that have been substantially altered to handle them, plus ‘special’ charging stations that charge without having to plug in the vehicle (from a device mounted in the floor.)
The concept of a level 5 vehicle is still decades away. In the meantime, we will need parking facilities and other infrastructure for the millions of vehicles that bring the work force into the city each day. Remember 85% of all commuting is still done with private vehicles.
Dale Denda and I will be discussing this in detail at PIE 2019 this coming March. Be there and hear the facts.
JVH
