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Comment by ck2 | Hacker News Reader

insert company name wants free news coverage for using drones.

So drones for now are kinda silly.

But what about self-driving cars?

Instead of half hour delivery, be more realistic like twice a day coverage a city (instead of for example UPS arriving 8pm at my door).

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My initial thought for self-driving delivery trucks was to combine the two. A truck drives itself to your house. a quadcopter flies out of the truck and leaves the package on your stoop.

that's exactly my comment from yesterday.. basically use the truck as a base station for the drones.

would just have to figure out how many drones vs how many packages are optimal.

Yes, that really makes sense so it can cover more distance.

However, they are aiming for delivery in under 30 minutes. The last time we tried delivering packages by air, road travel times were considered too long[1], and things have probably only gotten worse.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBVPG0XLbv0

a large number of apartments/condos do not have an outside stoop. Which makes this whole drone thing a bit impractical. UPS already has enough trouble opening a lobby door or getting past a security gate.

The only practical thing I see happening is scheduled deliveries within a certain 15-30min window and having the drone text you when the package is there so you can physically go and retrieve it out on the street/sidewalk.

Of course, the problem then becomes having a drone hovering and waiting while the person comes outside. And obviously that will cut into the profit of the delivery service, as you have a drone waiting on people to get out of the shower and stupid things like that.

Amazon suggested this was intended to deliver within 30 minutes after the order. You are presumably, barring some kind of emergency, not going to be leaving your place after ordering this service. I don't think the intent of this is to replace the stuff you traditionally order through the mail/courier services over the span of days.

Well then you don't need a drone. If you get texted that the delivery person is about to arrive at your place 20 mins before they get there, you can grab the package directly from the delivery person.

You can't really have an unmanned delivery truck. The truck can't put the package at your door, ring your doorbell, or collect a signature.

I suspect the limiting factor in twice-a-day deliveries is labor cost.

You could take one of those 7/11 cabinets where you scan a bar code to open it, and put it in a truck. Then an automated system calls, and asks where you are (i'm at my office xyz fake street) the car shows up around an agreed upon window, then calls you. You walk out to the truck, pick up your item, and it goes to the next person.

I would pay extra for that because I hate it when they leave a note because i'm getting my pants on.

For this reason, I think this whole drone thing is silly. By the time this is economically practical, you'll be better off with a self-driving car and a secondary ground delivery robot. Adding the complication of flinging them through the air isn't worth it.

(It may actually simplify the programming, which is probably why we're talking about this at all, but regardless of how great the programming is, it's just not going to be as safe to have these flying through the air, loaded with kinetic energy, through low-level airspace, as it will for them to be on the ground, rolling along, safely.)

A fleet of drones flying through the air is a silly concept in my city where buildings cannot be more than 3 stories high as to not block the views.

On the contrary, since they know no buildings are higher than three stories, they could just fly above the rooftops instead, without impeding the view.

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