
Unmanned grocery delivery is underway in Arizona - evo_9
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/business/autos/mobility/2018/12/18/unmanned-grocery-delivery-underway-arizona/38762315/
======
tokyodude
I think this is one of those examples of how unless regulated there will be
10x more cars on the road if/when self driving cars are ubiquitous.

Lots of people envisioned less cars because the with self driven cars the
current use of cars can be covered by less cars but self driven cars enable
more uses. Send your kids to their friends. Grandma goes shopping. Need to
borrow a drill pop it in car. Want to run a local cake store. Deliver the
cakes in the cars. Right now in my city there are billboard trucks that drive
around. I can imagine 10x more of them. And of course with no driver and lots
of competition prices will come down. Why take public transport when I can be
delivered door to door for less.

I enjoy public transport here in Tokyo and I'm happy for the excersize I get
walking to and from the station but, for example my office is a 20 minute walk
from my apartment. I usually walk it but if it's raining or too hot I've used
the Taxi app to have a taxi pick me up and drive me that short distance. The
cheaper, easier, and faster (time to pickup) things get the more likely I'll
take advantage of that more often.

~~~
femto
It will be only a matter of time until we have autonomous vehicle spam: cars
with billboards driving around (unless stuck in traffic) simply to be seen.

It could be a huge problem because of competing goals. The spammers won't care
about traffic flow as their only goal will be to have cars on the road and
visible, whilst people in cars will want to get places in a reasonable time.

~~~
scarejunba
Just Dutch auction off the limited quantity: road space. Modern technology
allows ubiquitous tracking and recognition of vehicles. No reason to subsidize
at that point. We can just charge everyone

~~~
mrfredward
We already have a system to turn road usage into government revenue.
Collection is easy efficient, and wastes zero time for the people paying. It
does a good job correlating not only to road use but also pollution produced.
In fact it's so easy to pay that many consumers rarely even think about it
when they're paying it, yet even anonymous cash payers can't find a way to
skirt around it.

It's called the gas tax, and it does a good enough job charging people for
their negative externalities that everyone seems to hate it.

~~~
Cogito
This would be true if fuel usage was linearly related to wear and tear on the
roads, or road usage.

Fuel taxes almost never tax heavy usage vehicles enough, compared to the
amount of damage they do to the road.

A fuel tax also doesn't solve the problem grandparent post is trying to solve,
excess usage of 'high value' roads.

If road usage, and road wear and tear, was evenly distributed then a fuel tax
would work, but the reality is that is simply a convenient and fairly
effective proxy solution. As technology improves a solution similar to
grandparent, some form of usage tolling, will become feasible and provide a
more effective outcome.

------
Animats
Not quite.

 _The unmanned delivery vehicles will be followed by a “shadow car,” which
will be driven by a human with the ability to stop or control it._

There was a Silicon Valley startup called Starship Technologies which had a
little robot vehicle running around downtown Redwood City sidewalks making
deliveries. It was always followed by a guy watching it.

~~~
IshKebab
Yeah I don't think we have had _any_ truly autonomous land vehicles released
into the wild yet. Any company that claims to do it had better provide proof.

~~~
sandworm101
What definition of autonomous? Various military groups have deployed aircraft
that do indeed operate totally independently, at least in some circumstances.
A Global Hawk drone doesn't fall out of the sky if disconnected from
controllers. It can continue flying totally on its own, as do cruise missiles.
Lots of autonomous boats (small ones) have crossed oceans. A modern torpedo is
essentially an autonomous submarine. But no, nothing on the streets of SF.

~~~
bluGill
I think the grandparent forgot to quality autonomous with safe. John Deere (My
employer) has been doing autonomous tractors for more than 20 years, there
have been videos of dogs driving tractors around while the farmer sips
lemonade in a lawn chair. John Deere lawyers will use any legal trick they can
to get them taken down though because it isn't safe to not have a human
sitting in the tractor watching for trouble (many videos remain because there
isn't much to go on). The tractor could kill someone and keep right on going
with no care so it isn't safe. Likewise drone aircraft can go one for a while
because presumably any other airplane in the area will avoid it. Boats can
cross the ocean because odds are it will not encounter another boat (relative
to the size of the ocean).

What is hard about self driving cars is we want our kids to be able to ride
their bikes on the same streets those cars drive on. Limit self driving cars
to just hiways with only other self driving cars and we could have had them 15
years ago and there would be near zero accidents. Dealing with human drivers
(who might not be sober), kids, wild animals, and the like is hard. (I'm sure
those in self driving cars have a much longer list of things things that are
hard)

~~~
sandworm101
Some of the autonomous boats know to keep away from the bigger ships, the ones
with transponders. Some airborne drones will react to TCAS alerts (Traffic
Collision Avoidance System) and change course/altitude in the same manner as a
human pilot would. I would assume that the largest military drones are capable
of flying home, or at least back to friendly territory, if they are
disconnected from controllers.

~~~
bluGill
There are two hard parts of hazard avoidance: identifying the hazard in the
first place, and dealing with large numbers of different hazards moving
around. Transponders, TCAS, and maps solve the first problem well enough for
boards and airplanes.(there are time where they fail but they are rare enough
to ignore). Except at ports/airports traffic is generally light as well
meaning drones and boats only need to worry about a small number of hazards
which makes this easier.

Autonomous cars are hard because children, and wildlife do not have
transponders, and worse have a habit of jumping out from cover right into your
path. Killing children is obviously bad. Even though who morally would argue
that wildlife don't matter still do not like the damage hitting the wildlife
causes to the car.

------
timonoko
When I read the Bob Shaws book "Vertigo" in 1979 about personal flight-vest, I
designed navigation rules of all aerial vehicles big and small. It is as
follows:

If the vehicle is X meters from the ground, the only allowed direction is (X
mod 360) degrees, and the only possible speed is X/10 meter per second. Hence
the vehicle moves along helical path until it reaches the only height where
the desired speed and direction is allowed. There cannot be any major
collisions only some slight grazes.

Ingenious, nicht wahr?

The problem of what is the "ground level" and how passenger jets behave is
beyond this brief introduction.

~~~
Qwertystop
Other problems: \- It may not be possible to arrange landing areas in the
desired direction \- Vehicles may not be able to make sufficiently tight turns
\- Fixed-wing vehicles cover quite a large vertical distance, especially when
rolling as they turn due to wingspans. There's plenty of room for converging
paths, and your rules may not allow enough leniency to avoid such paths. A
"slight graze" that takes off half a wing is not acceptable. \- Parallel lines
converge on the surface of the world. Two planes flying due north (X is a
multiple of 360) may collide at or near the poles.

~~~
scarmig
> Parallel lines converge on the surface of the world

The scheme can be trivially modified to deal with this, once you've figured
out a way to create a smooth tangent vector field on a 2-sphere.

~~~
jakob223
Choose the points of non-smoothness to be in the Bermuda triangle. Everyone
knows it's not safe to fly there.

~~~
TheCoelacanth
The Bermuda triangle is an extremely heavily traveled area.

------
xefer
I have to imagine that one of the perhaps unintended side effects of lots of
driverless vehicles buzzing around is that they'll act as a kind of traffic
calming mechanism. I assume these things will have to obey speed limits and
traffic laws to the letter.

~~~
soared
The biggest reason I support self-driving cars is because on a bicycle you
really see how often drivers roll through stops signs, don't use blinkers, and
break traffic laws.

100% selfish reasoning, but less human drivers makes the road safer for
cyclists (assuming robots use their blinkers).

~~~
duxup
I would like to see self driving bicycles, for the same reason ;)

Not trying to get into a bike vs car debate, they're all fine with me... but
man some bikers I come across are just flying through intersections / stop
signs too. Scares the hell out of me when I'm driving.

~~~
soared
No disagreement here, plenty of idiots on bikes too!

~~~
TulliusCicero
Yeah, there are absolutely assholes in every mode.

It's just that assholes in cars are a lot more dangerous than assholes who are
biking or walking.

~~~
IshKebab
Also roads are primarily designed for cars. You have to adapt the rules for
bikes.

~~~
gpvos
Maybe where you live. Roads can easily be designed or redesigned for other
modes of transport, like bicycles. We've been doing that in the Netherlands
for decades, with great results for road safety.

~~~
IshKebab
I'm sure you are aware that the Netherlands is more or less unique in having
good cycling infrastructure.

~~~
gpvos
It took us decades though. Any country can do it.

------
i_am_proteus
I like that their delivery vehicle isn't any bigger than it needs to be.

An interesting idea out of this: if self-driving vehicles reduce the collision
rate, road vehicles can (for some applications) get much lighter. Part of why
cars are so big and heavy is safety (along with optionality for cargo and high
speeds over mediocre roads). Shedding the steel safety cage could lead to
improved fuel economy, which would result in a tremendous reduction in carbon
output if scaled.

~~~
traek
It's a chicken-and-egg problem. You'd want to be among the _last_ people on
the road to adopt a lighter car, because being in a lighter car while other
people are still in heavy cars makes it much more likely for you to get killed
in the event of a collision.

I wonder if it will take legislation to solve.

~~~
thaumasiotes
> You'd want to be among the _last_ people on the road to adopt a lighter car,
> because being in a lighter car while other people are still in heavy cars
> makes it much more likely for you to get killed in the event of a collision.

There are many reasons to adopt a lighter car. Collision safety isn't one of
them, but if that was your only concern you'd be insane to have a car at all.

~~~
intertextuality
The problem is that for many people (in the US), a car is simply a necessity.
And car _safety_ is an important part of that. A lighter car would fare poorly
against an older, heavier car in the case of a collision. Therefore, the
lighter car is less safe.

That's why it's a chicken and egg problem. No one wants to be in a less safe
car when there are so many accidents (and deaths from them) every year.

~~~
olyjohn
People only want safe cars if they don't interfere with regular conveniences.
I'm sure I've posted this on here before, but if people really wanted safety,
we'd have roll cages, harnesses and helmets. But we want safety only when it's
convenient.

I think people talk a lot about safety, but I don't think that is as primary
of a concern as everybody says that it is for them. How many people actually
go research and learn about all the cars they are shopping, vs people who just
go to a dealership and listen to a salesman and buy what's in their price
range?

Most people don't even read the damn owners manual, they don't even know what
that big yellow light is (TPMS or CEL) that has been on for months. They won't
buy winter tires in the winter, even though you can get a set for like $700.
$700 is too much to spend to increase winter safety by a large margin on a
$30,000+ car. Hell, people don't even use turn signals. The little stick that
is less than 2 inches away from where your hand should be, and you don't even
have to take your hands off the wheel to activate it. The problem is you'd
have to decide which of your 16 cupholders to put the cup in, then reach way
over and put it down before you could signal.

~~~
intertextuality
> But we want safety only when it's convenient.

Regardless, safety is still wanted. Just because people don't go over the top
doesn't mean they don't want any at all. Having a lighter vs heavier frame
would make a significant difference in a collision between regular-style cars
and new, lighter ones.

The rest of your comment is attacking a strawman.

~~~
matz1
Its a non issue, I would buy and use a lighter car right now if it let say
significantly cheaper.

~~~
i_am_proteus
A lot of the safety-related weight is non-negotiable, at least in the US.
Every new car sold has a lot of airbags, and while they aren't mandatory, it's
impossible to earn a good safety rating (from the NHTSA, a government agency)
without them. So you could say the added "safety weight" (and drag, since the
airbags make the car bigger on the outside to preserve cabin space) has been
partially regulated into existence.

At some point in the future, I hope the NHTSA takes in "probability of crash"
into their safety ratings for self-driving vehicles. Otherwise the safety
bloat in modern cars will stick around. The equivalent of wearing a motorcycle
full-face helmet while riding a bicycle.

------
mooman219
My primary concern with autonomous vehicles is crime and abuse. People are
going to vandalize, damage, destroy, and salvage these vehicles. There's
already little being done about this in manned vehicles, so what's going to be
done for unmanned vehicles?

~~~
i_am_proteus
If they're deployed in areas with continuous LTE coverage, robust anti-tamper
measures are entirely feasible. Cameras (which most autonomous vehicles have
for perception) will witness and record the crime (and should be able to
upload the footage in near-real-time).

Stealing an unmanned vehicle-- and getting away with it-- should be very
difficult.

~~~
lozaning
We've got one of these that roam around our corporate campus:
[https://www.knightscope.com/knightscope-k5/](https://www.knightscope.com/knightscope-k5/)

Visitors like to walk up and take selfies with it, but no one messes with the
thing because it's uploading 360 HD footage to some control center somewhere.

Some drunk guy tackled the one that roams the company that makes thems parking
lot. He was promptly arrested based on all the excellent, well lit HD footage
of his whole run up and contact with the robot.

------
konschubert
> He said a vehicle at the demonstration didn’t drive because its battery had
> died.

I don't know what is worse: If that's true or if it's a lie.

------
jamisteven
Ive been following grocery delivery automation since the days of "Publix
direct" back in the late 90's in Seattle. I believe it was microsoft that
partnered with them to order groceries straight from a smart fridge, the MS
Home had one of these. I was recently reading an article on Bill Smith, CEO of
Shipt which was acquired by target for 550 Million a year back. What I could
not for the life of me figure out, was how that company was profitable, they
charge 99$ a year, for unlimited grocery delivery, how is that profitable?
After looking at their glassdoor entry, I believe its due in part to labor
rates being very low which wont be sustainable in the long term and I believe
is why he sold to Target. Anyhow, this automated delivery by NURO could be
something although a bit ahead of its time, as cities just arent ready for
autonomous vehicles just yet. I dont see why the grocery stores havent caught
onto this though, and adopted a take-out system only where orderes are placed
online and robots put the orders together, for bulk pickup. The battle of
grocery stores isnt the time to pick up the groceries, but the time it takes
to shop for what you need, parking, checkout out.

------
shadykiller
I wonder why most autonomous vehicle projects are piloted in Arizona ? loose
regulations ?

~~~
dmode
Having lived in Arizona, it is a perfect place to train autonomous vehicles.
Most of the Phoenix region is a grid with wide roads. No inclement weather.
Very few pedestrians. Clear road markings, isolated turn lanes. Basically no
crazy scenarios like turning right on market street in SF. Given that
autonomous cars are struggling in the most friendly environment tells me that
they are decades away from ubiquitous rollout

~~~
wutbrodo
All of those make it sound like a pretty terrible place to train autonomous
cars, given how narrow the space of driving situations is. Cities like SF,
where driving is kind of miserable, seem a lot more suited to training
generalized models.

Though I do agree with you: I recently took a job with a self-driving car co,
and am starting shortly (due to the technical challenges and great pay); but
the assumed timeline most people are operating under seem pretty optimistic to
me. That being said, I think much of the industry isn't expecting fully
autonomous vehicles until at least the 2040s.

~~~
UncleEntity
There's plenty of difficult places to train the robocars and I see them there
often.

I rarely (if ever) see them on the westside where the roads are nice, logical
grids but mostly Tempe, Scottsdale and Chandler where they aren't so nice and
neat. Nothing like driving around SF admittedly.

~~~
wutbrodo
I actually happened to spend the week of Thanksgiving in Scottsdale (incl a
lot of time in old Town), and yea, it doesn't really compare. Weather, hills,
pedestrian density and behavior, complexity of street signs and road rules,
etc etc etc.

------
YeGoblynQueenne
Unmanned, but "shadowed" by a car with humans. The autonomous vehicle industry
excels in one thing, for sure: _moving the goalposts_.

------
tree_of_item
A quick thought: when a customer enters the code and the doors open, can they
somehow mess with other people's food? How do they prevent this?

~~~
guynamedloren
Looking at the photos: the vehicle itself is tiny, as is the cargo space for
groceries. There are two cargo areas with separate doors, so presumably each
customer's delivery could have an isolated cargo space.

I could imagine this concept scaled up to van size or even truck size,
integrated with something like a refrigerated amazon locker. Exciting stuff!

------
ourmandave
Who is Kroger and Nuro's insurance carrier on this if something bad happens?

What's the liability if their autonomous grocery kart runs over someone?

------
samstave
I have often thought:

Why isnt there an unmanned transport infrastructure which could be built
between endpoints.

Take Hyperloop as a model-example. Instead of hyperlooping people about - why
not only freight?

Imagine a mini-hyperloop enclosed tube about 10-feet in diameter, which has
delivery sleds between hubs, which interconnect...

Then do a 20' diameter tube with sleds, and you have a trucking system which
can be managed with BGP level routing experience...

~~~
walrus01
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pneumatic_tube_mail_in_New_Yor...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pneumatic_tube_mail_in_New_York_City)

Everything old is new again.

As to why it's not currently done, if somebody comes up with a significantly
lower cost method of doing purely underground construction (cut and cover
trenching), directional drilling or small tunnel boring that doesn't cost a
huge amount of money per linear meter, they'll become a gazillionaire. Not
just "loops" but all electric, gas, water, sewer and telecom utilities will
clamor for the tech.

~~~
niftich
There's been a theory circulating around for a while that Musk's Boring
Company is well-positioned to construct utility tunnels, and their seeming
focus on transportation is essentially a loss-leader PR effort to drum up
support from investors and the general public. Utility tunnels aren't exciting
enough on their own, but there's a fair bit of money to be made in that
industry.

Musk has been long mum on the subject but he recently said, at a National
League of Cities event in Los Angeles on 2018-11-08 [1][2], that's he's open
to the idea.

Of course, the big issue with tunneling, and construction projects in general,
is often utility relocation, and not necessarily knowing where other utilities
and surprises lie ahead of time.

[1] [https://www.forbes.com/sites/alanohnsman/2018/11/09/its-
not-...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/alanohnsman/2018/11/09/its-not-all-
hyploops-elon-musks-boring-co-wants-to-dig-your-citys-next-sewer/) [2]
[https://arstechnica.com/cars/2018/11/elon-musk-on-double-
dec...](https://arstechnica.com/cars/2018/11/elon-musk-on-double-decker-
freeways-permitting-and-building-sewers/)

------
dmode
Another overhyped autonomous deployment. Just a gimmick like the "autonomous"
Lyft ride I had in Vegas, where the car had two people instead of one in a
regular run of the mill yellow cab

~~~
2bitencryption
these overhyped autonomous deployments are how we slowly progress to
accurately-hyped autonomous deployments.

------
philip1209
A killer feature

