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Suggestions Needed: Home Design Changes for Anti-Package-Theft Drone Delivery

Here's an idea for a design competition

By Rain Noe - January 20, 2021

in Competition

Package delivery by drone will soon be common. Amazon, Walmart, UPS and others are all trialing the technology.

With some design changes to our living spaces, package-delivery-by-drone could make package theft, a/k/a "porch piracy," a thing of the past.

What's needed is for designers to come up with a system not for the last mile, but for that last ten feet: How does the package get into the recipient's home? If drones just drop deliveries unattended in the driveway, as has been shown in concept videos, it will do nothing to stop package theft. Furthermore, how could residents of dense urban apartment buildings also benefit from drone delivery?

I propose a design competition: Home Design Changes to Enable Secure Drone Delivery. The competition should span urban, suburban and rural areas, and could encompass either retrofitted designs or ground-up changes. (For the sake of design fun, we'd assume no onerous regulations, i.e. drones could fly directly to apartment windows in crowded cities.)

Some examples of categories:

Urban, Ground-Up Redesign

What if the top story of apartment buildings were designed with a rooftop drone package reception center for the entire building? Would residents take the elevator up to retrieve their packages, or could a system of dumbwaiters spirit packages downstairs to the mail room? Or would there be some other system, say smart lockers?

Urban, Retrofitted

No matter how small the apartment, many NYC residents sacrifice at least one window to install an air conditioner in the summertime. Could the same be done with some type of retrofittable drone dock, allowing package delivery directly to the window of one's apartment? What should this dock look like? How can it keep packages protected from the elements? Would it coexist with an air conditioner, or require a second window? How would it be installed?

Suburban/Rural, Ground-Up Redesign

In Japan, electric clothes dryers are uncommon, due to the high cost of electricity. Therefore, nearly every house and apartment is designed with a balcony, specifically for line-dried clothes. What if houses in America were designed with balconies as drone package drop areas? Ideally these would be located high up, making it difficult for a package thief to access. Or could belfries become an architectural feature again, just without the bells?

Suburban/Rural, Retrofit

What affordable changes could be made to existing homes, ranging from single-story trailers to suburban manses, to accept packages from drones? Window-mounted docks? Milk doors with automatic drawbridge openings that can swallow packages through the walls? And what would these look like from inside the house?

Please give me some feedback here; if you all think this is a good idea, I'll pitch the idea of a design competition to the higher-ups.

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Comments

Geoff Graves

4 years ago

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Great insights! Luckily we have the solution!
Valqari has solved that very "last inch of the last mile" logistic problems. Our patented Smart Drone Delivery Mailbox provides a secure and convenient delivery receptacle for both drone and traditional deliveries.
We enable asynchronous and autonomous drone (and regular- terrestrial) transport. Neither the sender nor the recipient need to wait for or touch a drone-- it all happens in the background. The package is tracked (full digital chain of custody) and when it arrives, the recipient is notified. The package is kept safe until it is convenient to be picked up.
Check out valqari.com and https://tinyurl.com/Valqari1

I'm happy to see the need is becoming a pain point that we can address. Cheers!

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Ross Oliver

4 years ago

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In my opinion, this is solving the wrong problem. The reason we have unattended packages is a mismatch between the schedules of the deliverer and recipient. With reliable robotic delivery, this will never be the case. The robot deliverer will always be available to bring your thingy directly to you at your convenience, no lonely package required. Hopefully this will also eliminate or at least vastly reduce the need for enclosing cardboard boxes.

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Douglas Schaller

4 years ago

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Sounds like a great idea.

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Dakota Parker

4 years ago

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Where do I submit my idea?

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