Imagine you're in a crowded parking lot and don't feel like circling for what seems like hours to find a spot. Now, what if you could tell your car to find its own spot and, even better, command it to pick you up again when you're ready to leave?
That's the promise of Nissan's NSC-2015.
One of the objectives in the design of the car is to "reduce time loss, such as that spent on looking for parking," said Toru Futami, expert leader for Nissan's IT & ITS development department, in a press release.
Nissan's NSC-2015, on display at the CEATEC 2012 conference in Japan, can find its own parking spot and return to pick you up after being summoned via mobile app. The car uses sensors and a camera to keep track of its location, and gives an owner a 360-degree camera view via an LTE connection of the area around the car, allowing him or her to remotely trigger the car's alarm in case of suspicious activity. Nissan will begin selling the car in 2015.
(Source: Nissan)
To that end, after the NSC-2015 uses sensors and a map to gain an awareness of its own location, finds itself a spot, and safely parks in it, its owner can use a smartphone to access an automated valet parking app to summon the car for pick-up when it's time to go.
The car also has an integrated LTE connection that allows its owner to keep track of its status and location via a smartphone. This type of monitoring can come in handy in case someone tries to break into the car, as the camera provides a 360-degree view of what's happening directly outside of it, according to Nissan. In case of a possible intrusion or attempted theft, the NSC-2015's owner can set off the car's alarm remotely.
Nissan isn't the only automaker -- or company, for that matter -- to explore the design of robotic, self-driving cars, which many believe is the future of driving. Car manufacturer and rival Honda debuted its self-driving car in 2009, which helps a human driver do the job.
More famously, a couple of years ago Google demonstrated a self-driving Toyota Prius that, powered by Google software and hardware, could anticipate oncoming traffic, stop signs, or pedestrians in a crosswalk. Rather than go completely driverless, Google's self-driving car, like Honda's, supplements the work of an actual person behind the wheel.
As romantic as a car that drives itself sounds, it will probably be some time before these robotic autos hit the road across the US, as most states still have laws that require someone to actually drive a vehicle for it to be roadworthy.
However, in California, Google's self-driving cars have legally logged hundreds of thousands of miles.
Nissan expects to have its self-parking car on the market by 2015.
I've been a little leery of the self-driving car concept, but I have to say, the idea of a car that would cruise crowded parking lots by itself and find me a spot--now that has some merit, in my book. Of course, there's always the paranoia about the car taking off and never coming back, but I suppose those concerns dissipate as people get more accustomed to what initially seems like out there technology.
Hi Beth, I agree. To have automonous vehicles driving on roads and neighbor streets seems dangerous. I wonder if the car has the ability to detect kids darting out into the steet to retreive a ball and stop immediately? Also, to drive in hazardous conditions like snow and rain storms requires an experience driver. I wonder how much AI can be programmed into these vehicles to handle such driving conditions. But like you, I'm kind of digging the find a parking spot in a crowded mall garage scenario.
@TJ: That's the kind of imagery that could potentially throw this technology right off the map. Imagine the chaos, what's akin to autonomous road rage, of self-parking cars. Yikes. I'd want to steer clear.
Herein lies the biggest obstacle of autonomous vehicles: Human's inability to come to terms with the fact that we are not better than computers at many tasks. It turns out, that computers are now incredibly good about seeing objects like children and other cars. They (computers) are never distracted like a human, their sensors watch constantly and don't turn away when they are looking for (or at) their cell phone, children, or any other of many distractions that Americans have in their vehicles. Computer systems have reaction times are far better than human reaction times. I only wonder why collision avoidance systems aren't more popular. The technology on the top of the line Prius is where the future needs to go on all automobiles, these systems would solve many of the easy to avoid accidents that are caused by distracted drivers. Granted, it will be some time before cars go completely autonomous, we love to be in control, but systems that prevent distracted driver errors would save the insurance industry huge amounts of money.
I live in the land of 100+ temperatures in the summer. I don't care so much about parking in a spot closest to where I'm going. I want a car that will park itself in the shade.
Call me a Luddite, but I'm not sure I want my car wandering around without me. I'd prefer a GPS type of application that would verbally direct me to a open space.
As a middle age human, the idea of retirement in a self driving RV is really appealing to me. Imagine taking a nap while the RV travels to your next destination. Imagine the RV robotically recharging itself when the batteries are in need. Imagine not having a 70 or 80 year old human driving the RV down the road. That is how I see my retirement in 25 or 30 years. It is an awesome dream, can we make it the reality?
I think the new term will be "computer gridlock" as driverless cars will not be able to see beyond the nearest car and see other driver intentions by looking them in the eye or seeing them smile, wave, or flip you the sign.
Autonomous parking takes out of the equation the value of finding the closest parking spot. This would also eliminate the animosity towards those empty handicap spots at the front of the lot.
Don't be surprised when the AVU (American Valets Union) starts lobbying congress to create laws that prohibit this type of technology. This would put their entire industry out of business.
Computers are cool tools to aid us with mundane task but I rather be in control of my vehicle without the worry of a system malfunction. The key to safe driving is to pay attention to the road. To rely on a computer for driveability is becoming too dependent on technology which makes society lazy and not able to think on their own. A simple example of technology dependency is the TV remote. For alot of folks if their not able to find it the TV is broke as opposed to just turning the channels manually.
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