I have a friend who uses a wheelchair and he hates encountering these things in the wild. I know there's a couple different companies making these things and I'm not sure if they all behave like this, but they take up the whole sidewalk and won't backup or turn to get out of the way.
Instead they just sit there blinking and beeping at my friend, and of course in a wheelchair it's not easy (or safe!) to go over the curb or anything to get around them.
Automated delivery sounds cool at first glance but they probably shouldn't be on the sidewalk if they can't accommodate the humans who also need to get around.
Robots that cannot share sidewalks with humans, including humans in wheelchairs, should be banned from sidewalks. Full stop. End of discussion. They can use the streets proper if they want to.
I'm sure there is some way to formalize that using ADA sidewalk requirements or something similar.
I really don’t understand how a four wheeled self-driving powered vehicle is allowed to drive on the sidewalk when riding a bicycle on the sidewalk in that same city is illegal.
Probably under the same regulations that allow a powered wheelchair on the sidewalk. A low maximum speed makes up for a lot of things. But they should have a plan for encountering a wheelchair user.
Because corporations have more rights than the common man and these robots are the property of corporations.
If you as a regular person cause some sort of damage to a corporation you’ll be arrested and locked up while they determine the legality and if there was an actual illegal damage. If these corporations cause regular people problems then it’s “oopsies, you can sue us in court with your far smaller resources in a system that is heavily incentivized for those with more resources” and no equivalent corporate entity is getting the equivalent of cash bail.
Vehicles have been far too dominant in city planning, it's probably time to re-prioritize, make it look more like Netherlands or some other European countries perhaps.
The vast majority of Americans prefer roads being dedicated to vehicles. I live in a town that is stealing drivable roadway for bike lanes. It's a total wast of tax dollars. There is never anybody in this bike lanes. Because even in this flaming blue, bike friendly city, people drive because it's just better.
Often it feels unsafe to bike on roadways, so people just avoid doing so. And most bike lanes on roadways have trash in them and are basically a glorified shoulder.
"Stealing" as in having a public process for proposed street designs that you can't be bothered to attend.
"There is never anybody in this bike lanes" you don't see them because they aren't stuck in traffic like you. Also the city has to build out a full network of high quality bike facilities to convince a bunch of skeptics and scaredy cats to get out of their cars and enjoy life and actually get somewhere instead of just be traffic all the time.
There's this weird "bicyclist viewpoint" where the only acknowledged possible purpose of leaving your house appears to be to get your body to a different point within a relatively small area.
Personally, if I go anywhere at all, I'm usually moving more cargo than I could move on a bicycle, and doing that is the whole purpose of the trip. Cargo or no, it's often to a place I could not practically reach on a bicycle. And when neither is true, I can usually walk. The number of trips where I could use a bicycle is not large enough to make it worth maintaining one, and that wouldn't change no matter how good the infrastructure got.
Also, for a good chunk of the year, it's icy enough here that basically nobody rides bicycles... and in the rest of the year, it's not uncommon to get unpredictable thunderstorms. Sorry, riding in that is not "enjoying life".
By the way, the economy that feeds you and maintains your bicycle also depends on motorized road vehicles and the infrastructure to support them. The converse is not true; you and your bike could go away and nobody else would notice.
Seriously, they're very, very limited, niche vehicles. If your life fits into that narrow niche, then good for you... but the rest of us are sick of hearing from you.
Not sure where this icy, thunderstorm-prone city where it's either walk or drive with nothing in between is, but it's certainly pretty far outside my experience.
From what I've observed, the vast majority of car trips in my city could be easily replaced with a bicycle trip.
We would most certainly notice if the modest bicycle traffic in our city was replaced with car trips. The already terrible traffic would be significantly worse. "Stealing" some space for cars for a drastically more efficient means of transportation that's also 5-6 times faster than walking is a huge win both for people who want to get places reliably and on time and those of you who are always carrying cargo or can't cycle for some reason.
You wouldn't hear from me at all if it weren't for accusations like "stealing" space from cars (who in turn stole entire walkable city centers and streetcar lines!) and just made a little room for those of us who are able (which is most people!) to choose a healthy, efficient, humane form of transportation instead of hauling a 3 ton steel caged air-conditioned living room with armchairs and sofa on every trip.
Not sure where this icy, thunderstorm-prone city where it's either walk or drive with nothing in between is, but it's certainly pretty far outside my experience.
Montreal. I think there've been three thunderstorms in the past week, none of which I would have predicted if I'd stepped outside a few hours beforehand. Yes, that's an unusual week, but I've been caught in storms often enough, and you can't build your routine around conditions you can't rely on.
And only absolute fanatics ride bicycles in the winter. Even though I think the facilities are pretty good.
From what I've observed, the vast majority of car trips in my city could be easily replaced with a bicycle trip.
You observe people driving around in cars. You have no way to know where they're going, where else they've been or may be going on the next leg of the trip, what they're carrying, anything about their physical condition, or, well, anything other than that they're driving. Even if you did a formal "study", you wouldn't know if you were asking the right questions (not that the people doing "studies" usually even try).
If I saw a delivery robot blocking someone in a wheel-chair, I'm moving it off the sidewalk and I'm not particularly concerned if it's able to complete its trip after that.
Don't pussyfoot around it. Break the fuckin' thing. Let the owner know this is absolutely fucking unacceptable. A person would get the shit kicked out of them for that kind of behavior.
Delivery robots also can’t come to the door. So for a person with a disability, or who simply ordered food because they didn’t want to leave the house for whatever reason (maybe they have the flu), it kills the value proposition.
Instead they just sit there blinking and beeping at my friend, and of course in a wheelchair it's not easy (or safe!) to go over the curb or anything to get around them.
I would keep on rolling into the robot. Sometimes the provider needs some production incidents to get motivated into fixing a bug.
Or to understand that public sentiment makes their stupid business venture wholly unviable, economically. That happens when people break your shit. We didn't get traction on scooters and e-bikes until they started landing in ponds and off overpasses. Your politicians want new business. They won't help. You have to fight the businesses directly.
Why would the city be liable for shitty robot behavior?
Maybe you could construct a situation where they would be but I can't imagine it would be one that would play out in real life. A city allowing robots to operate would make the robot company to follow all applicable laws" including ADA so unless the city's lawyer is really really bad this lands on the robot company.
It's not the city's responsibility to make the sidewalks delivery robot friendly, it's 100% a failure on the part of the robot company
I don't expect them to make the sidewalks robot friendly, but I think they are responsible for keeping the sidewalks clear of obstructions - so if the robots are obstructing people in my view the city should remove them and fine the company.
Failing to do that would be a failure to maintain the sidewalk space, at least that's my thinking.
...The robots aren't (by and large) just sitting there taking up space. They're not something you're going to be able to have a standard city street cleaning crew just pick up and toss in the bin when they go around in the early morning. They're actively scooting around, mostly from midmorning through early evening, because that's when people want to receive deliveries.
I thought it was obvious but to be extra clear "remove" in this case would mean fining the company and revoking their permits to operate in the city. Not... running around and herding robots into a truck or whatever.
Remote controlled by people in faraway LCOL places where they may not understand or be trained on Western disability norms, but are certainly incentivized by how many deliveries they complete.
The same issues exist for platform moderation. Often they're complex decisions on divisive topics, delegated to people outside the culture with little training, time, or incentive to make wise judgements.
I think it depends on the robot. The ones around here seem to be semi-automatic and seem to get taken over by a human when they're blocked, but it often takes 5 or 10 minutes before that happens.
I worry that some enterprising person representing the delivery companies will find a way to make it so that if humans in wheelchairs block the path of the robots, then it's the humans who will have to yield.
It makes me think of that scene from The Man In The High Castle - "drag on the state."
Comments
I have a friend who uses a wheelchair and he hates encountering these things in the wild. I know there's a couple different companies making these things and I'm not sure if they all behave like this, but they take up the whole sidewalk and won't backup or turn to get out of the way.
Instead they just sit there blinking and beeping at my friend, and of course in a wheelchair it's not easy (or safe!) to go over the curb or anything to get around them.
Automated delivery sounds cool at first glance but they probably shouldn't be on the sidewalk if they can't accommodate the humans who also need to get around.
Robots that cannot share sidewalks with humans, including humans in wheelchairs, should be banned from sidewalks. Full stop. End of discussion. They can use the streets proper if they want to.
I'm sure there is some way to formalize that using ADA sidewalk requirements or something similar.
I really don’t understand how a four wheeled self-driving powered vehicle is allowed to drive on the sidewalk when riding a bicycle on the sidewalk in that same city is illegal.
Probably under the same regulations that allow a powered wheelchair on the sidewalk. A low maximum speed makes up for a lot of things. But they should have a plan for encountering a wheelchair user.
Perhaps, but I imagine those regulations are written around an actual person being involved.
Because traffic laws work for cars and pedestrians. Anything else in between in fuzzy and hard to define or legislate
Because corporations have more rights than the common man and these robots are the property of corporations.
If you as a regular person cause some sort of damage to a corporation you’ll be arrested and locked up while they determine the legality and if there was an actual illegal damage. If these corporations cause regular people problems then it’s “oopsies, you can sue us in court with your far smaller resources in a system that is heavily incentivized for those with more resources” and no equivalent corporate entity is getting the equivalent of cash bail.
The law protects but does not bind corporations while binding but not protecting individuals.
There should be some some way to sue for unlawful restriction of access to public infrastructure.
As far as I'm aware, you can't just put a border on a sidewalk.
Bots that stop you from using sidewalk are essentially that. A border on a public infrastructure put there by some company.
close to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trespass_to_chattels ?
If blocking access to your store, your car, etc. this kicks in maybe.
How about no? They'll block traffic there, too.
Vehicles have been far too dominant in city planning, it's probably time to re-prioritize, make it look more like Netherlands or some other European countries perhaps.
I suggest a priority order somewhat like:
pedestrians > bicyclists > delivery bots > vehicles
currently in America I suppose it probably looks more like this currently:
vehicles > delivery bots > pedestrians.
The vast majority of Americans prefer roads being dedicated to vehicles. I live in a town that is stealing drivable roadway for bike lanes. It's a total wast of tax dollars. There is never anybody in this bike lanes. Because even in this flaming blue, bike friendly city, people drive because it's just better.
Often it feels unsafe to bike on roadways, so people just avoid doing so. And most bike lanes on roadways have trash in them and are basically a glorified shoulder.
"Stealing" as in having a public process for proposed street designs that you can't be bothered to attend.
"There is never anybody in this bike lanes" you don't see them because they aren't stuck in traffic like you. Also the city has to build out a full network of high quality bike facilities to convince a bunch of skeptics and scaredy cats to get out of their cars and enjoy life and actually get somewhere instead of just be traffic all the time.
There's this weird "bicyclist viewpoint" where the only acknowledged possible purpose of leaving your house appears to be to get your body to a different point within a relatively small area.
Personally, if I go anywhere at all, I'm usually moving more cargo than I could move on a bicycle, and doing that is the whole purpose of the trip. Cargo or no, it's often to a place I could not practically reach on a bicycle. And when neither is true, I can usually walk. The number of trips where I could use a bicycle is not large enough to make it worth maintaining one, and that wouldn't change no matter how good the infrastructure got.
Also, for a good chunk of the year, it's icy enough here that basically nobody rides bicycles... and in the rest of the year, it's not uncommon to get unpredictable thunderstorms. Sorry, riding in that is not "enjoying life".
By the way, the economy that feeds you and maintains your bicycle also depends on motorized road vehicles and the infrastructure to support them. The converse is not true; you and your bike could go away and nobody else would notice.
Seriously, they're very, very limited, niche vehicles. If your life fits into that narrow niche, then good for you... but the rest of us are sick of hearing from you.
Not sure where this icy, thunderstorm-prone city where it's either walk or drive with nothing in between is, but it's certainly pretty far outside my experience.
From what I've observed, the vast majority of car trips in my city could be easily replaced with a bicycle trip.
We would most certainly notice if the modest bicycle traffic in our city was replaced with car trips. The already terrible traffic would be significantly worse. "Stealing" some space for cars for a drastically more efficient means of transportation that's also 5-6 times faster than walking is a huge win both for people who want to get places reliably and on time and those of you who are always carrying cargo or can't cycle for some reason.
You wouldn't hear from me at all if it weren't for accusations like "stealing" space from cars (who in turn stole entire walkable city centers and streetcar lines!) and just made a little room for those of us who are able (which is most people!) to choose a healthy, efficient, humane form of transportation instead of hauling a 3 ton steel caged air-conditioned living room with armchairs and sofa on every trip.
Montreal. I think there've been three thunderstorms in the past week, none of which I would have predicted if I'd stepped outside a few hours beforehand. Yes, that's an unusual week, but I've been caught in storms often enough, and you can't build your routine around conditions you can't rely on.
And only absolute fanatics ride bicycles in the winter. Even though I think the facilities are pretty good.
You observe people driving around in cars. You have no way to know where they're going, where else they've been or may be going on the next leg of the trip, what they're carrying, anything about their physical condition, or, well, anything other than that they're driving. Even if you did a formal "study", you wouldn't know if you were asking the right questions (not that the people doing "studies" usually even try).
Only at first, they'll fragment after the first few cars.
If I saw a delivery robot blocking someone in a wheel-chair, I'm moving it off the sidewalk and I'm not particularly concerned if it's able to complete its trip after that.
Don't pussyfoot around it. Break the fuckin' thing. Let the owner know this is absolutely fucking unacceptable. A person would get the shit kicked out of them for that kind of behavior.
Delivery robots also can’t come to the door. So for a person with a disability, or who simply ordered food because they didn’t want to leave the house for whatever reason (maybe they have the flu), it kills the value proposition.
I would keep on rolling into the robot. Sometimes the provider needs some production incidents to get motivated into fixing a bug.
Or to understand that public sentiment makes their stupid business venture wholly unviable, economically. That happens when people break your shit. We didn't get traction on scooters and e-bikes until they started landing in ponds and off overpasses. Your politicians want new business. They won't help. You have to fight the businesses directly.
This would seem like an easy ADA case.
I'm not aware of someone filing such a case yet, but I would think so too.
I'm not sure if you would sue the city or the robot company, or both? It feels like a failure on the part of both.
Why would the city be liable for shitty robot behavior?
Maybe you could construct a situation where they would be but I can't imagine it would be one that would play out in real life. A city allowing robots to operate would make the robot company to follow all applicable laws" including ADA so unless the city's lawyer is really really bad this lands on the robot company.
Whatever entities, city or state which are doing the licensing and permitting I'd imagine might be able to be sued.
Because it's a bit of a unique new situation with no caselaw, it would be a pretty open question of who could be sued for what.
It's not the city's responsibility to make the sidewalks delivery robot friendly, it's 100% a failure on the part of the robot company
I don't expect them to make the sidewalks robot friendly, but I think they are responsible for keeping the sidewalks clear of obstructions - so if the robots are obstructing people in my view the city should remove them and fine the company.
Failing to do that would be a failure to maintain the sidewalk space, at least that's my thinking.
...The robots aren't (by and large) just sitting there taking up space. They're not something you're going to be able to have a standard city street cleaning crew just pick up and toss in the bin when they go around in the early morning. They're actively scooting around, mostly from midmorning through early evening, because that's when people want to receive deliveries.
I thought it was obvious but to be extra clear "remove" in this case would mean fining the company and revoking their permits to operate in the city. Not... running around and herding robots into a truck or whatever.
I would take a contract with any city government to run around and deal with problem robots
I would love to be the worlds first Blade Runner
The city gives them permits, they don't just freely operate wherever.
This seems surprising. As far as I know all these carts are controlled remotely in real time.
Remote controlled by people in faraway LCOL places where they may not understand or be trained on Western disability norms, but are certainly incentivized by how many deliveries they complete.
The same issues exist for platform moderation. Often they're complex decisions on divisive topics, delegated to people outside the culture with little training, time, or incentive to make wise judgements.
I think it depends on the robot. The ones around here seem to be semi-automatic and seem to get taken over by a human when they're blocked, but it often takes 5 or 10 minutes before that happens.
I worry that some enterprising person representing the delivery companies will find a way to make it so that if humans in wheelchairs block the path of the robots, then it's the humans who will have to yield.
It makes me think of that scene from The Man In The High Castle - "drag on the state."
Note for the downvoters: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/20/us/politics/special-educa...
Gee, yeah, not an ill-founded worry at all. Wake the fuck up.