BMW Tech Lets Valets Drive Your Car Like a Remote-Controlled Toy
As proof that the technology works today, we parked a BMW iX at CES 2024 without getting into the car.
Will the valets of the future still take joyrides when they're driving your car from a cube farm on the opposite side of town? We ask because BMW has dreamed up a remote valet service where professional parkers would remotely move vehicles from the curb to a parking spot and back, all while sitting in an isolated operations center miles away. At CES 2024, we used what looks like a racing simulator rig to drive a BMW iX electric SUV around a parking-lot cone course about 50 feet from where we were sitting. While the teleoperated valet service is only a concept right now, the technology exists to make it a reality today.
The demonstration car ran unique software, it used the same radar, ultrasonic sensors, cameras, controls, and cellular connectivity that are already installed in customer vehicles. The remote operator drives the car using a video-game-style steering wheel and pedals and five screens. The main screen shows the view from the front or rear camera, while the monitors flanking it display identical 360-degree views around the vehicle. Touchscreens on either side of the steering wheel are used to start or end the remote-operator takeover, shift between park, drive, and reverse, plus monitor error messages and connectivity statistics.
For now, the demonstrator BMW iX tester is limited to just 10 kph (6 mph) when it's remotely piloted, and the presence of a nearby object or turning the steering wheel will cause the limiter to drop even lower. The vehicle automatically stops if the car detects an imminent collision or an object blocking its path and the brakes are applied as soon as the driver releases the accelerator.
The forward camera's limited field of view makes even a jogging pace feel fast and the fish-eye distortion at the edges of the image makes judging distances tough. The remote operator, however, isn't responsible for the precision work of actually parking the car. After the driver navigates to the parking spot, the final maneuvers are handled by BMW's existing automatic parking feature that can handle perpendicular or parallel spaces.
BMW says that 40 percent of its customers regularly use valet and it envisions the teleoperated service as a stopgap until fully automated parking becomes feasible. The business case is built around cutting costs for valet providers and the businesses they service. BMW claims a single remote driver could jockey cars for as many as 20 parking lots and, unlike the Automated Valet Parking standard that BMW also supports, there's no need to install cameras or sensors in the parking garage or lot. The company also sees opportunities in fleet applications, such as shuffling cars around a rental lot.
If BMW decides to put its remote-operated valet service into production, we'll likely see it between 2025 and 2030. BMW hopes other automakers will take notice and embrace the concept, which it developed in collaboration with supplier Valeo, because the concept needs scale and brand-agnostic interoperability if it's going to truly revolutionize valet parking.
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I fell in love with car magazines during sixth-grade silent reading time and soon realized that the editors were being paid to drive a never-ending parade of new cars and write stories about their experiences. Could any job be better? The answer was obvious to 11-year-old me. By the time I reached high school, becoming an automotive journalist wasn’t just a distant dream, it was a goal. I joined the school newspaper and weaseled my way into media days at the Detroit auto show. With a new driver’s license in my wallet, I cold-called MotorTrend’s Detroit editor, who graciously agreed to an informational interview and then gave me the advice that set me on the path to where I am today. Get an engineering degree and learn to write, he said, and everything else would fall into place. I left nothing to chance and majored in both mechanical engineering and journalism at Michigan State, where a J-school prof warned I’d become a “one-note writer” if I kept turning in stories about cars for every assignment. That sounded just fine by me, so I talked my way into GM’s Lansing Grand River Assembly plant for my next story. My child-like obsession with cars started to pay off soon after. In 2007, I won an essay contest to fly to the Frankfurt auto show and drive the Saturn Astra with some of the same writers I had been reading since sixth grade. Winning that contest launched my career. I wrote for Jalopnik and Edmunds, interned at Automobile, finished school, and turned down an engineering job with Honda for full-time employment with Automobile. In the years since, I’ve written for Car and Driver, The New York Times, and now, coming full circle, MotorTrend. It has been a dream. A big chunk of this job is exactly what it looks like: playing with cars. I’m happiest when the work involves affordable sporty hatchbacks, expensive sports cars, manual transmissions, or any technology that requires I learn something to understand how it works, but I’m not picky. If it moves under its own power, I’ll drive it.
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