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Difficult situation on campus: traffic jam of food delivery robots

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Re: Difficult situation on campus: traffic jam of food delivery robots

#71

Post by inglor_cz »

steelframe wrote: post #40
throwawaynay wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

maybe they pity the students who are going to get cold pizza 2 hours late?

Maybe they should pity the human delivery workers who they are helping to put out of a job?

The gig economy isn't great either, though. These are tough jobs.

The development from human workers to robots mimics what happened in delivery of messages. When I was a kid, people would deliver telegraphs to your door - for a substantial markup. These days, e-mails get delivered to your inbox without any human in the loop, and for free.

Re: Difficult situation on campus: traffic jam of food delivery robots

#72

Post by rosndo »

0xbadcafebee wrote: post #44
_fullpint wrote: post #13

Absolutely hate these scooters from an ADA prospective. My neighborhood is a mostly quiet one near the center of a large city, where there are a lot of mothers who push their kids in strollers, older folks with canes, and some people even in wheelchairs. On the weekends -- sometimes the weekdays as well depending on the time of the year -- the city gets flooded with both tourists, and suburbanites who want to go to a…

The thing is there's no designated place to park them. You can't put them on the property line next to the sidewalk. Many sidewalks don't have a "planter" or other non-walking area. Sidewalks weren't designed for this. I think we should ban sidewalk scooter parking. The public right of way is not a parking lot for private companies. As an aside: many (most?) people who need sidewalks choose to use the road instead be…

> The thing is there's no designated place to park them.

We have designated parking spots for rideshare scooters in London.

Re: Difficult situation on campus: traffic jam of food delivery robots

#74

Post by shiftpgdn »

AuthorizedCust wrote: post #18

I work at a different university that has these same units. Watching them cross streets is comical. They are excessively conservative. While backing up one time (on a sidewalk), one gently ran into me. I should have flopped and cried out to risk management.

They're frequently driven by people making $1-3/hr in Colombia.

Re: Difficult situation on campus: traffic jam of food delivery robots

#75

Post by Accacin »

_fullpint wrote: post #13

Absolutely hate these scooters from an ADA prospective. My neighborhood is a mostly quiet one near the center of a large city, where there are a lot of mothers who push their kids in strollers, older folks with canes, and some people even in wheelchairs. On the weekends -- sometimes the weekdays as well depending on the time of the year -- the city gets flooded with both tourists, and suburbanites who want to go to a…

So a minor inconvenience for cleaner air in your neighbourhood?

Ofc, I feel for disabled people in this situation, but personally I'll pick one up or move it if I see that it's in the way.

Here when the were first released, the parking was a bit scuffed, but recently it seems people have been making a much greater effort to park them correctly.

Re: Difficult situation on campus: traffic jam of food delivery robots

#76

Post by iso1631 »

throwawaynay wrote: post #64
steelframe wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe they should pity the human delivery workers who they are helping to put out of a job?

I don't think anybody is dreaming of being an underpaid delivery worker for ubereats with zero benefits, high risk of accidents, and just overall terrible working conditions when we invented aqueducts who cared about the water delivery workers? those are terrible jobs and they should be automated/replaced

We got rid of literally shit jobs with plumbing

https://historydaily.org/night-soil-men

While I was doing a degree I held two types of jobs over time. One was a shop worker, one was delivering food (pizza one summer, chinese the next)

The delivery job was far better than the shop job (I quit the shop job after 2 evenings)

Re: Difficult situation on campus: traffic jam of food delivery robots

#77

Post by only4here »

bourgoin wrote: post #69

A couple of years ago, I was attacked by a Kiwi bot near a UC campus. This is my story. The bot and I were moving towards each other on a sidewalk, and when I came close it stopped, as they do when sensing an object in front of them. But there was an awkward moment as I tried to go around it and it repeatedly jerked forward an inch as its motor kicked on and off. Maybe I was walking around the very edge of its radius…

Saw another HN user's comment about automatic battle-bot features. Maaaybe it's not the best idea in this case!

Re: Difficult situation on campus: traffic jam of food delivery robots

#78

Post by Robotbeat »

Ekaros wrote: post #53
sharken wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Electric scooters have been heavily regulated where i live, helmet is now required and you have to leave them at designated locations. And a photo upload showing how it was parked is now also required. Oh, and Friday and Saturday between 00 and 05, you cannot use the scooters. It kinda makes me sad that we can't just let people use scooters as they please, but as you observe that isn't working. It was much the same w…

City bikes which have stations seem much better option. At least if run by city itself, higher installation cost, but means that they are much more orderly.

Also subject to the same kind of abuse if our society continues to degrade to justifying more and more antisocial behavior.

Re: Difficult situation on campus: traffic jam of food delivery robots

#79

Post by Cthulhu_ »

_fullpint wrote: post #13

Absolutely hate these scooters from an ADA prospective. My neighborhood is a mostly quiet one near the center of a large city, where there are a lot of mothers who push their kids in strollers, older folks with canes, and some people even in wheelchairs. On the weekends -- sometimes the weekdays as well depending on the time of the year -- the city gets flooded with both tourists, and suburbanites who want to go to a…

The county should act; assign parking spaces for these things, fine the companies if they find any outside of the designated spaces. The companies can sort it out with their customers.

We are seeing the same thing with electric scooters and bikes (and they get torched sometimes), they get parked anywhere and the county's on board with it because it's "green".

This was NOT as much of a problem with rental bikes in e.g. London, because they had designated stations for picking up and parking them; the user would get charged extra if they did not park their bike up properly.

Re: Difficult situation on campus: traffic jam of food delivery robots

#80

Post by avereveard »

thepasswordis wrote: post #55
_fullpint wrote: post #13

Absolutely hate these scooters from an ADA prospective. My neighborhood is a mostly quiet one near the center of a large city, where there are a lot of mothers who push their kids in strollers, older folks with canes, and some people even in wheelchairs. On the weekends -- sometimes the weekdays as well depending on the time of the year -- the city gets flooded with both tourists, and suburbanites who want to go to a…

> Usually when I see this, I just knock the things over and push them out of the way. So you make the problem worse ? Why don’t you take 2 minutes and push them to the side of the sidewalk if you care so much about ADA access? You can fix the problem you are encountering, and the people you want to protect CANT. You are choosing to make the problem worse for them? Why? I live in a major downtown full of these scooter…

No lol, it's the other people responsibility not to be a nuisance.

But I agree throwing them aside is not the optimal solution.

Municipality looking for money could get some large cash influx from ticketing improperly parked scooters, the owning company can decide to eat the loss or flip the ticket on the user, either way people will get educated fast.

It would only take for the law enforcement to enforce rules that are already there

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