NCR colleges test a robot that can park your car

NOIDA: As the number of cars on the road multiplies, finding a parking spot in the city has become increasingly difficult. Wouldn't it be nice if a robot valet could reduce the hassle of finding a parking space and park your car for you?

The faculty members of nine NCR tech colleges may have found a solution. On Friday, they demonstrated a prototype for a robot which would facilitate fully automated car parking without any input from the driver. The demonstration was part of e-Yantra, an IIT-B initiative to spread education in robotics and embedded systems, which is being sponsored by the ministry of human resource development. It was held at MGM College of Engineering and Technology in Noida, which is a nodal centre for the programme.

The colleges had developed the model, where the robot was equipped with a sensor which would scan the parking lot for vacant spots and on finding a place; it would park the car in the selected spot. The project is still in its initial stages and the exact mechanism is yet to be worked out. A similar automated system is already in place in Dusseldorf airport in Germany, which uses a forklift and an array of sensors and radar system to park the cars.

Krishna Lala, senior project manager of e-Yantra Project of IIT Bombay, said that the project is for education and research purposes. "The respective college may develop it further for commercial use," she said. Sanjay Malhotra, vice-principal of Delhi University's Rajdhani College, a participant said,

"The project is at initial stage and there are some technical problems. But it will help to ease parking problem if implemented," he said.

Other colleges that participated included Ghaziabad's Ideal Institute of Technology and Indraprastha Engineering College and Greater Noida's Sharda University's School of Engineering and Technology.