Amazon's idea for urban delivery could bring a hive of activity to a block near you.
The company applied for this new patent using the title “Multi-Level Fulfillment Center for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles” but as you can see from the patent’s technical drawing, Amazon’s idea for urban delivery is a tall cylinder that berths delivery drones like a hive of bees does with its workers.
Although Amazon’s idea for speeding up deliveries is one the credos that drives innovation at the company, this idea might be a step too far. At least in the way that it’s been presented to the patent office.
If you take a close look at the included sketch, you’ll notice a solitary human entering the delivery tower of doom at the bottom right. Tractor-trailers also approach the center from a myriad of angles. Ostensibly, this implies that there will be some sort of pick and place operation that occurs on the first few floors of the teaming tower of commerce. And while the same description can likely be applied to any Amazon sorting facility across the globe, there’s something unsettling about the idea of layers of human effort being transferred to automated bots in such close quarters and with such efficiency.
Maybe I’m just having a knee-jerk reaction to how much more this building codifies the idea of people being simple cogs in the global commercial machine. Or maybe I’m finally settling into Luddism?
I doubt it’s that.
What I do know is that Amazon’s recent moves, and now this patent, have me worried for the architecture of our cities.
For an arguably less frightening approach to shipping, find out how the Mercedes-Benz Vision Van Brings Drone Delivery Down to Earth.