After a year of testing with 1,600 users, four parking robots will now park passenger cars at Lyon Saint-Exupéry airport in France. The objectives are to facilitate travelers’ parking while optimising parked-car placement to save up to 50% of space.
In long-term outdoor parking, travelers who have previously booked their place on the internet will simply leave their vehicle in one of the twelve reception boxes. Then comes the robot to take care of everything: the customer gets on his shuttle to go and board the plane; once back from the trip, they need only scan the reservation to retrieve their vehicle.
The developed system is based on electric robots, but not exclusively so. An artificial intelligence drives them and is able to calculate the optimal place to park a car so that it is easily recoverable. With cameras and a 3D scanner accurately analysing the surrounding environment, Stan the robot takes the vehicle (weighing up to 3 tons), lifts it, and puts it away. The cars are parked in multi-rows. Traffic lanes are eliminated, which densifies the parked vehicles so more of them can fit.
In addition to the new application at Lyon, Stanley Robotics already supply Roissy airport, and soon London-Gatwick as well.
