Instead they just sit there blinking and beeping at my friend, and of course in a wheelchair it's not easy (or safe!) to go over the curb or anything to get around them.
Automated delivery sounds cool at first glance but they probably shouldn't be on the sidewalk if they can't accommodate the humans who also need to get around.
I'm sure there is some way to formalize that using ADA sidewalk requirements or something similar.
If you as a regular person cause some sort of damage to a corporation you’ll be arrested and locked up while they determine the legality and if there was an actual illegal damage. If these corporations cause regular people problems then it’s “oopsies, you can sue us in court with your far smaller resources in a system that is heavily incentivized for those with more resources” and no equivalent corporate entity is getting the equivalent of cash bail.
How about no? They'll block traffic there, too.
I suggest a priority order somewhat like:
pedestrians > bicyclists > delivery bots > vehicles
currently in America I suppose it probably looks more like this currently:
vehicles > delivery bots > pedestrians.
It makes me think of that scene from The Man In The High Castle - "drag on the state."
This seems surprising. As far as I know all these carts are controlled remotely in real time.
I'm not sure if you would sue the city or the robot company, or both? It feels like a failure on the part of both.
Maybe you could construct a situation where they would be but I can't imagine it would be one that would play out in real life. A city allowing robots to operate would make the robot company to follow all applicable laws" including ADA so unless the city's lawyer is really really bad this lands on the robot company.
Because it's a bit of a unique new situation with no caselaw, it would be a pretty open question of who could be sued for what.
I don't expect them to make the sidewalks robot friendly, but I think they are responsible for keeping the sidewalks clear of obstructions - so if the robots are obstructing people in my view the city should remove them and fine the company.
Failing to do that would be a failure to maintain the sidewalk space, at least that's my thinking.
Which raises the question: why should these robots be prioritized over humans? Why can't they use the streets when there are pedestrians? Why should the SAFETY OF HUMANS be compromised for these profit-seeking corporations and their robots?
Tip them over to make a path. The sidewalk is for humans, the robot is a guest.
Can't program your robots to behave properly? Have fun spending a fortune running after them!
That's a good start, now ask some of the same questions about cars vs pedestrians. Ultimately, big money will win as it always does. Get used to dodging robots.
Roads used to be for people and wagons, till cars showed up and kicked the people off. Now delivery bots are trying to do the same thing, kick the humans on foot off the sidewalks.
Delivery places like that, the ones that existed before Grubhub and DoorDash, those are the ones that know efficiency.
If you’ve ever seen the delivery robots in person or on video you’ll see that they are super clumsy, and unlike human DoorDash drivers they make the restaurant employees come outside and fill them up.
It’s been enough of an issue where DoorDash sent me a snarky email about how often I report issues with my order. Essentially accusing me of lying for a discount, which I’ve never done.
If a variable was removed where the restaurant was directly responsible for what’s going in and it knows where to go, that could be a big improvement in some aspects of the experience.
That said, I’m not a fan of these robots taking over sidewalks. I also think the inability for the robot to actually come to the door kills it for me. If I need to go out to the sidewalk to get the food from the bot, I might as well just drive to the restaurant too.
So I think they are attempting to address a real issue I’ve had, but I don’t think it’s the right solution. What worked a lot better was restaurants that employees their own delivery people. So it was the restaurant that was accountable for the whole experience. With the DoorDash model, no one is accountable for anything. It seems like there is little incentive to make sure the customer is actually happy, there are too many independent parties involved in the end-to-end process.
I live in a dense urban area where it's easy to walk to get stuff, so that biases my perception, but why do you order from door dash? Is it a time constraint? Unless I was incapacitated or seriously out of time (which, as you say, Door dash doesn't reliably solve for), I can't imagine not walking within the range of these robots.
I’ve been dealing with a lot of burnout and depression, so the motivation to leave the house is low. I work from home. The idea of driving just to go pick something up and bring it home is one my brain won’t jive with. If I’m driving somewhere it’s going to be the grocery store. That also means taking the shower I probably didn’t take before work. Since I’m going to the store, if I were to pickup prepared food I’d want it to be on the way home, which limits the options a lot. The area a mile from me with a lot of options is a small suburban downtown, which usually means dealing with a parking structure and then walking, if I wanted to drive there. The hassle factor is high.
If I was in your situation, I would do what you do, and have. I’m just far enough away where it annoying to walk to anything, and driving is equally annoying for such a trivial thing. Then the burnout/depression has me living the hermit life for the most part. Now that I’ve spent so much time inside, it requires a bigger reason to get me out. It’s a problem; I’ve found myself outside looking up at the sky, like I forgot how high it went.
I know this isn't the point of your post but I hope you have a good support network to help you through this. Wishing you the best.
My country has great cycling infrastructure. I never see bikes on the sidewalk. There is a direct link between the two.
I don't get it. Can you explain why humans on bicycles are relevant to a discussion of motorized robots? Are you talking specifically about e-bike users scooting along on the sidewalk at 40mph or something?
It takes up public space in the US, but the operator oftentimes doesn’t benefit from actually living and working in the US. At worst, it literally removes gig jobs from the US while still maintaining the physical presence a delivery person here could do, puts downward pressure on labor pay, costs stay the same for the customer, with no improvement (often worse, imo) to the customer delivery experience. So why do we allow it?
Do we really have to outsource something that inherently requires physical and local presence?
When I was organizing the results, the personal conclusion I reached was that this kind of design is ultimately about redistributing existing public space. And in that process, the first people to be pushed to the margins are, by and large, the transportation disadvantaged. This delivery robot is consuming the same public resource, public space, and the same dynamic plays out: the weakest end up being pushed out first. I think it's a similar issue.
Sounds like they're now good enough to deploy and be annoying.
Not that I would ever suggest anyone mask up, blind them with paint, then take a crowbar to these things or anything
color me surprised that yet another tech start up came in like a bull in a china shop acting like being a "disruptor" is a cool blanket excuse to be an asshole of a company.