Self-Parking Car Available In Japan

sinjayde writes "Yahoo!/Reuters is reporting that Toyota has released a car for sale in Japan that is able to park itself: 'Toyota's new hybrid gasoline-electric Prius sedan uses electrically operated power steering and sensors that help guide the car when reversing into parking spaces.'" No need to rely on the reverse parking formula anymore?

Comments

It had to be done...

[Anonymous Coward]

In Soviet Russia, car parks you!

hmm, not so sure....

[mut3]

you still gonna do some work here, since it only helps you back in. so, if you hit the car next to you, dont blame it on the car (like you normally do)!!

dependency

[djshake]

what happens when we forget how to park cars ourselves? technology is good, but people are getting too darn lazy these days. is parking really that hard? survey says: only for old people

Re:dependency

[Gogl]

And here's the irony: I agree with you that the only possible justified use of these sorts of driving-aid devices would be to help old people (although maybe I'm just callous because I generally think that if they're too old to drive they just shouldn't be driving), but only the young people will be willing to use them. Hell, I'm not even that old and I wouldn't trust some sort of auto-parking thing. Only people who are young when it comes out and grow up with it will be used to it and willing to use it themselves.

I bet it was the same thing with automatic transmission at first. A car changing gears on it's own, many of the people who were only used to manual probably didn't particularly want to make the switch. Some will switch, but the vast majority of the transition depends on time.

Or to make a long story short, new technology can take upwards of a generation to really assimilate into society. But you probably knew that anyway, I just felt like pointing that out as it seemed pertinent or something.

Re:dependency

[NanoGator]

"what happens when we forget how to park cars ourselves?"

Is it really all that likely? It's simply a navigation task, not some particular combination of voodoo prayer and the position of the moon. Calculators didn't kill the study of math, elevators didn't kill the climbing of stairs, and even if you made those arguments it's arguable that society has grown to a higher level since both these devices came along. So tell me, why would a self parking car make people forget how to park cars? That's a ridiculous, cliche filled, statement.

"but people are getting too darn lazy these days."

People are smarter than they ever were. They do a lot more these days than they did in the olden days. Lazy?

"is parking really that hard?"

If it were, dontcha think that these things would have been around ages ago? Back in the 50's they had a car with a fifth wheel so you could pivot your car into a paralell spot. Didn't exactly take off. However, technology has gotten a lot better these days, it's gotten cheaper, and car companies are in a competition to get more marketshare. What you're seeing here is a result of competition, not some need to park cars. Besides, have you ever had a valet driver bump your bumper? Happens to my car daily.

driving test.

[woodchip]

1. buy car that can park it self
2. sell driving lesson school for people who are afraid to parallel park on driving test. with the promise they can use car on the test.
3. ????
4. profit.

Re:driving test.

[bersl2]

sell driving lesson school for people who are afraid to parallel park on driving test. with the promise they can use car on the test.

In some states, it is no longer a requirement to know how to parallel park in order to get a license. Therefore, even though I've been driving for two years, I still can't parallel park.

Sad but true.

Who pays?

[moehoward]

Will your insurance company pick it up if you (I mean it) damages another car?

In the US, these have to pass some rigorous gov't inspection and testing before they are allowed on the road. I don't think I want the liability.

Is parking really that hard? Are people really that stupid and lazy? Don't answer that. Can I get a robot to feed me my cereal in the morning?

Re:Who pays?

[EvilTwinSkippy]

The way liability insurance is structured, you pay regardless. Anyone, and by logical extension, anything you grant control of the car is covered by your policy.

I don't think you will have the option of recovering damages from the manufacturer. You ultimately pulled the switch that told the car to auto-park.

Re:Who pays?

[LetterJ]

This is why I don't think we'll see cars driving themselves in the U.S. any time soon. They've built the vehicles so they can handle the freeway without a driver (some documentary I saw). However, even if the rate of accidents with self-driving/parking vehicles is lower than with real drivers (and I'd tend to believe it could be) even 1 accident would launch liability lawsuits galore.

Re:Who pays?

[bfields]

However, even if the rate of accidents with self-driving/parking vehicles is lower than with real drivers (and I'd tend to believe it could be) even 1 accident would launch liability lawsuits galore.

Speaking from complete ignorance, just trying to think through the economics of this--if the self-driving system actually lead to less accidents, then in general you'd expect there to be less money overall awarded in liability lawsuits. The difference would just be who would be responsible--some liability that was previously the driver's would become the car manufacturer's. So you'd expect the automaker to end up spending more on liability insurance (raising the cost of the car), but you'd expect the car driver's liability insurance to decrease correspondingly.

The driver's insurer could say "buy this (more expensive, because of the technology and the costs of the maker's insurance) self-driving car and we'll give you a discount."

So naively it's not obvious that the increased liability on the automakers' part would make the whole project impossible.

Maybe an automated highway is more complicated than something like a self-parking mechanism, because many more parties are involved (e.g., the people who built and designed the highway), but still, if they could prove that there would be a decrease in accidents, then it might be possible to distribute the costs of risks in a reasonable way.

I sincerely doubt, however, that it is possible for anyone at this point to *know* that the accident rates will be lower. Without more experience, an automated highway sounds like a risky venture--it might initially seem to be safer, but then a subtle bug might cause something catastrophic to happen after it's been in use for a while. Perhaps it was the difficult-to-forsee problems that they were worried about in the situation you describe. But if the threat of suits here is encouraging caution, that strikes me as a good thing--surely radical changes affecting something as critical as highway safety *should* be undertaken very cautiously.

--Bruce Fields

Parking is easy

[EvilTwinSkippy]

Now find me a car that can FIND parking by itself. That I will pay money for.

Re:Parking is easy

[whiteranger99x]

Now find me a car that can FIND parking by itself. That I will pay money for.

Thats an easy enough solution...just get yourself a tank and parking problems will be a thing of the past ;)

Re:Parking is easy

[rmohr02]

Buy a UPS truck. You can park those things anywhere.

self merging cars,...

[epicstruggle]

what we now need are cars that merge onto highways for us. Just like how fighter planes take off without the need of pilot input. I dont think many drivers would go for a car that drives for them, but something that makes merging into fast/dangerous traffic would be greatly appreciated.

later,
epic

Re:self merging cars,...

[bfields]

what we now need are cars that merge onto highways for us.

Unfortunately merging is one of the maneuvers that requires the most communication; in busy traffic you really have to negotiate with the other people on the road--signal and move over a little, watch to see if the approaching driver acknowledges you, and then, depending on the reaction, either move over a little more or retreat and wait for the next gap.

Exactly the sort of procedure I'd imagine to be most difficult to automate....

--Bruce Fields

Obvious joke

[gilesjuk]

What happens when the system crashes? :)

BBC Story

[Arc04]

Here is the BBC's take on the same story.

The technology for this was shown off months ago - I saw the story. I am glad it is finally being released to the public.

Re:The article text to avoid /. effect:

[AdEbh]

Thanks for that. 'Cause you know Yahoo gets /.ed every time.

- ebh

Not new

[Anonymous Coward]

This is not new. I've seen a similar system nearly 12 years ago used by a handicapped photographer at my high school. His car was retrofitted with a very similar system that would park the car by itself.

I can't say I...

[bob670]

really enjoy driving anymore as it is, and with most major metros (and smaller metros as well) experiencing some level of gridlock, I drive as little as possible in areas where this would be of any real use. I know we are talking about a car company, but I would rather see this kind of effort go in to public transportation/mass transit.

Re:The real question

[EvilTwinSkippy]

How lazy CAN we get?

Robots to auto-post to Slashdot?

The forgotten danger

[menscher]

When backing into a space, your front end swings out a bit. So you have to watch for traffic approaching from behind before you do this. Does the car think to do that? No? Whoops.

bigger engine and motor

[evenprime]

I'm more impressed by the fact that the engine in the new prius is now 78 horsepower(it used to be 70 hp) and the motor is 50kW/67hp (it used to be 44 hp).

Toyota did the right thing. The new prius is bigger than the old one (now a midsize, not a compact), has fewer emissions, more horsepower, and accelerates faster. Now, if they could only make it cheaper, too....

cluster

[chochos]

I can imagine a Beowulf cluster of these. It must look exactly like rush hour.

importing one

[Sarin]

Be carefull if you want to import one, in Japan they drive on the left hand side.
I imagine when you try to autopark in a right hand side country it will park in the middle of the road instead of the sidewalk.

Better yet

[earthforce_1]

A car that continuously drives itself around the block, and avoids the need for parking. (Or parking tickets) Paying for the extra fuel is probabably cheaper that hourly parking in most major cities, and certainly would be in Japan.

Interesting Idea

[ewhenn]

How about we adapt this technology so that it automatically detects if the parking spot is for a handicapt or not. If the owner parks illegally in one of these spots, the car backs the F$&K over them.

Wrong place for intelligence

[El]

What we need is a car that watches the driver, and says things link "You're drunk! I'm NOT starting!" and "Hang up the cellphone and pay attention to your driving!"

Re:Wrong place for intelligence

[mosch]

the first one exists.

highways and magnets

[doormat]

The freeway you're talking about is Interstate 15 near San Diego, CA. They built a single lane, multi-mile segment on the inside median, with magnets under the road every 100'. The car would be programed to follow the magnets and make course corrections. There were also ultrasonic sensors on the front and back. The demo had 3 cars at 100mph, 10' apart with the system engaged.

Reminds me of a bad card I read

[zapp]

On the front was a picture of a woman trying to parallel park, crunching into all the cars around her. The title was "Why women can't drive..."

on the inside..

Because men will tell them this is 6 inches:
--> ==== <--

Needless to say it wasn't quite the punchline I was expecting :)

Re:Yuck

[ergo98]

"Enough of these rubbish do-dads that frankly, no good driver would ever need."

Traction control and anti-lock brakes both can accomplish feats that the best driver on the planet Earth couldn't accomplish, given that they are modulating their input thousands of times per second, absolutely optimizing power/braking and acceleration. They aren't necessities, and you could approximate them, but don't fool yourself into thinking that you could do a better job. If you claim otherwise, then I'd suggest that you should have relay wires installed in your dash to let you handle the spark timing yourself as well.

Where technology has just finally offered a better choice is in transmissions: Until recently the "standard" was always the superior driving choice, as the automatic options were hydraulic circuitry turds often with 3 gears. Now there are continuously variable automatic transmissions that achieve the absolute perfect coupling between power plant and road surface all of the time. Alternately the computer controlled 5 or 6 speed automatics are quite extraordinary now as well.

How stunt drivers do it

[Anonymous Coward]

Get front wheel drive manual car with a very very good handbrake.

Head towards the parking spot at a fair speed, as perpendicular to the spot as you can. Swerve car and pull handbrake and then brake and counter steer so that you neatly skid and slide in sideways.

With this method you can park in a spot that's practically the same length as your car - just depends on how accurate you are.

Getting out requires a bit more space - the length of the space must be slightly more than the diagonal length of your car. Pull handbrake to max, turn steering wheel max (to lock) towards side you want to exit from. Stomp on clutch, red line engine, release clutch, burn rubber and gradually spin car out of space.

Not recommended in uncontrolled environments.

Re:I won't give up Stick!

[HTMLSpinnr]

It's not a true CVT, but an E-CVT, because there are no varying gear ratios to change torque multiplication. The car has one single speed and engine torque output to the wheels is varied by resistance on an electric generator. This is driven through a pretty slick planetary gearset which gets the job done. Gobs of electric motor torque takes care of slow speed starts so that the car performs somewhat like an ordinary car.

I know. I own a 2002 Prius, and have ordered the 2004 (too bad they don't have self parking here in the States).

Go see the article on How Hybrids Work at howstuffworks.com

Glad to see they put this in a hybird car.

[ModernGeek]

I love the Hybrid car philosophy, it is a step away from gas-guzzling SUV's. This is a great incentive for people to buy a Prius over another car too, and the body on the new models look alot better than the older ones. My friends dad has a Prius, and it drives fast, and it rides ALOT more smooth than a traditional car. I just don't know why this idea was never embrassed before. Also, how come we don't have cars that can drive themself on the interstate? It doesn't seem like it would be hard at all, since they could just implement sensors into an interstate quite simply since it is all managed by the government, an open standard could be created by the Govt, and all the car companies could follow.

I saw this today

[abhisarda]

on the NHK channel(Japanese TV, nhk.or.jp). It is actually a very spiffy car. It looks sleek and more like a mini-minivan than the regular Prius. Also, this model was black in color.
In the demonstration the man driving the Prius stopped the car a little ahead of a parking spot, then on the LCD screen, pressed the left & right buttons(Im guessing, cuz it was in japanese and too small to read) and then the car parked itself right on the spot intended. The driver at that time was "look ma, no hands". There were front and rear cameras and while parking the car was emitting a sound similar to the "put seatbelt on" one.