The annoyance of parallel parking may soon no longer be an issue, thanks to a group of Chinese inventors and their innovative parking robot.
Guided by lasers, the “Geta” robot slides underneath the car, picks it up, locates a place for it in the parking lot, and places it in the tight spot.
According to Geta’s creators, Yee Fung Automation Technology, the robot takes just two minutes to park a car, is able to move in all directions, and will make better use of space than humans.
“The parking robot is designed to increase parking space,” Yee Fung chief executive, Marco Wu, said in a Reuters interview. “The robot can go everywhere … and will reform parking in the future”.
Wu added that Geta works by means of radio signals sent between the robot and a map of the lot, which allow for the robot to be directed to an available spot.
According to the Chinese government, mainland China is predicted to have more than 200 million vehicles by 2020, resulting in a greater need for parking space.
While the robot will cost more than 1 million yuan (around R2,2-million), Wu said that a great deal of interest in the technology has been shown by cities where space is particularly limited.
“There are many companies interested in our products, such as commercial property companies in Singapore and London,” he said.
