5 minute read
Automatic parking systems
Automated parking system solutions
Current car parking practices at residential, commercial and public buildings can be greatly improved with automated parking systems
Words | Jan Kristof Noll, Lödige Systems GmbH, Germany
Based in the German town of Warburg, the Lödige Industries Group is developing fully automated, space-saving and convenient car lots of the future. Lödige’s specialists have more than 60 years of expertise in handling and storage technology to draw on when developing and implementing these solutions.
Interest from Danish cities
In the summer of 2015, Lödige Industries installed the largest automated parking system in Europe. The Cubile S system was part of the recently constructed Dokk1 library and community center in Aarhus, Denmark. So far, over half a million cars have used the automated car lot that has almost 1,000 parking spaces. Lödige’s turnkey solution included delivering the mechanical and electrical equipment, carrying out the steel and concrete work, and installing the transfer cabins, as well as the payment, control and IT systems.
Parking in the Cubile S facility is stressfree and convenient for drivers. They simply park their cars at ground level in a well-lit and spacious entrance cabin, and take a parking ticket. After that, their car is parked automatically in a ‘park and hide’ operation. The cabin’s roller shutter closes and the car is transported underground in a lift. There, the Lödige Shifter, an ultra-flat robot, drives underneath the car and lifts it up at the wheels. The transfer vehicle then carries it from the lift to the actual parking space. To retrieve the car after the parking ticket has been paid, the whole process operates in reverse. When the car appears in the cabin at ground level, the driver can climb in and drive away. Only a chauffeur could make the process more convenient.
Cubile S car lots are quick and efficient thanks to Lödige’s palletless Shifter technology. Less space is required for the same number of cars compared with conventional car lots. Drivers benefit too: they no longer need to park their car precisely, because the platform automatically aligns it.
The fully automated Cubile S parking system is particularly suitable for office blocks and public buildings with a parking capacity from 50 to more than 1,000 spaces.
A Cubile S car lot also provides approximately 320 parking spaces at Blox, the new Danish Architecture Centre in Denmark’s capital, Copenhagen. Lödige has optimized the use of space in this car lot even further by accurately measuring the cars. Jan Noll, responsible for car parking systems at Lödige Systems, explains, “We actually measure every car. This means that we know whether we are dealing with a small vehicle or a large limousine. Our management software then decides whether to allocate two parking spaces to two large cars, one behind the other, or to use these two spaces to park three small cars. This
means that, because we measure the vehicles accurately, we can make dynamic use of the available parking spaces.”
A pallet-based parking system
The Cubile P parking system can be used to create up to 50 parking spaces and is characterized by its extremely compact design. This parking system, which makes flexible use of space, is also particularly suitable for retrofitting into existing buildings. The modular system allows all the individual components to be ordered as required. This means that Cubile P can also be integrated into small spaces.
The vehicles are transported on pallets that use a plug-and-play principle to park the cars side by side on driven conveyors – like a sliding puzzle. Many more conveyors can be added, depending on the layout of the building. They transport the vehicle pallets in two, three or four directions.
Parking using the Cubile P system could not be easier for drivers. They can simply park and leave their car on a pallet in a cabin. The cabin door closes and a lift automatically transports the car down into the parking system.
An alternative solution to the entrance cabin is also available in the form of a canopy, which allows the system to be hidden completely. When the car is parked or retrieved, the transfer cabin is only briefly visible as a canopy type roof, which then retracts to form a platform that can be driven over.
Individual parking solutions
One of the strengths of Lödige Industries is building special machines. Individual solutions are produced to customer requirements, which may later become a standard option. The most recent development for a specific customer is in the process of being created under an apartment building in Sydney, Australia. Lödige’s task was to install an automated system into the space occupied by a conventional car plot, and thus save space and excavation work – but with the same number of parking spaces. This challenge produced a car parking system on six levels that makes use of the stacker crane technology found in air freight applications.
The first step in this solution is still to drive the car into a cabin. Due to the spatial constraints, once the vehicle has been driven in, it is rotated 180°, so that the driver does not have to reverse the vehicle out later. A door then opens in the rear section of the cabin to a lane containing the stacker crane. While the Cubile S solution in Aarhus has a transfer vehicle on each horizontal level, the stacker crane in the Australian solution moves both horizontally and vertically (for example, it lifts and transfers in one unit). The stacker enters the cabin from the rear and proven shifter robots move underneath the car, pick it up, and place it on the stacker, which takes it to the relevant parking place where it is unloaded by the shifter.
Electric mobility is a rapidly expanding sector. Lödige Industries is working on solutions such as being able to park electric cars in an automated car parking system and charge them at the same time. For example, pallets can be fitted with electrical connections for type 2 IEC plugs.
One-stop parking solutions shop
Lödige Industries provides solutions, planning, higher-level IT development, system integration and machinery, all of which is manufactured in-house. In addition, the company provides on-site commissioning, service, maintenance and 24/7 remote support to ensure maximum reliability and safety for its customers.
Lodige’s Cubile S, Cubile P or other customized car parking systems offer benefits over conventional parking lots and garages, and Lödige believes its systems are the car lots of the future. n
Opposite: Lödige’s
Cubile P parking system uses pallets to transport the vehicles to parking spaces
Left: Lödige’s Cubile
