Since the University of Tennessee at Knoxville launched a fleet of food delivery robots in 2022, locals have called them everything from cute and convenient to annoying and weird, but the city is likely to give the little automatons a new label: banned.
The Knoxville City Council voted unanimously and speedily in favor of prohibiting personal delivery robots at its April 16 meeting, following the recommendation of city staff who said the robots could pose safety and accessibility risks downtown.
After supporting the ordinance on first reading, councilmembers will vote again on final passage at its April 30 meeting. Councilmembers unanimously supported a six-month moratorium on the robots that gave city staff time to study them, but the pause expires April 30.
The robots could block sidewalks downtown and cause congestion, said Carter Hall, the city’s director of strategic policy and programs. Even if robots would have trouble navigating cramped sidewalks and busy commercial areas downtown, they could be deployed some day, Hall said.
“We just don’t think that it makes sense right now at the intersection of available infrastructure and the operating models that we see currently used,” Hall said.
The prohibition will not affect robots at UT, whose streets and sidewalks are owned by the state. City staff looked to UT as an example of how the robots can work well. One key difference between the campus and the city is the width of sidewalks. There is room on most campus sidewalks for students to share the right of way with robots, even at busy times.
Why is Knoxville set to ban food robots?
Other cities have allowed private companies to deploy the battery-powered and self-driving robots as a sustainable solution to pandemic-era labor shortages. The robots transport packages or food to customers who open them with a unique code.
Delivery robots need to operate on sidewalks, but their sensors force them to stop if something or someone is in their way, which can leave them stuck in crowds and late on deliveries. Early adopters, like tech hubs San Francisco and Toronto, later restricted or banned the robots citing pedestrian safety concerns.
The council’s move to ban the robots rather than approve a pilot program is different from how it treated electric scooters. After a pilot program from 2019 to 2021, city leaders allowed two companies – Bird and Superpedestrian – to deploy electric scooters downtown with rules in place.
The scooters are not supposed to be ridden on sidewalks or left in the way of cars or pedestrians, but they have caused annoyance to some cyclists and drivers.
After discussions with UT leaders, tech companies, city engineers and disability advocates, city staff concluded it would be better to prohibit food robots than open downtown sidewalks to the technology through a pilot program. If the robots are allowed in the future, the city would likely require companies acquire a permit to deploy them.
Daniel Dassow is a growth and development reporter focused on technology and energy. Phone 423-637-0878. Email daniel.dassow@knoxnews.com.
