This robot helper failed to win over the NYPD

Announced with great enthusiasm in September 2023, the New York City Police Department’s experiment with the Knightscope K5 surveillance robot has finally come to an end, and the device has been mothballed. This example shows the limits of this type of robot, even if more and more robotic devices will likely be coming to the streets of New York and other big cities around the world.

In the end, New Yorkers won’t have seen much of the Knightscope K5, since the robot responsible for patrolling the city’s subway at Times Square station, has been retired, according to the New York Times. On paper, the experiment looked promising. Knightscope K5 had been trained and configured by the police to provide regular patrols between midnight and 6 am in the subway corridors. Measuring almost 1.60, (5 ft 3) in height, the robot moves at the same pace as a human, never exceeding 5 km/h (3 mph). Equipped with several cameras and a call-for-help system, it can follow a precise, predefined route and “patrol” any area before returning to its charging station on its own.

Despised by users, sometimes mistreated and often compared to a toy or, worse still, a trash can, because of the way it looked, the robot had major shortcomings. For example, it was unable to use the subway stairs properly. The robot almost always had to be accompanied by a human police officer, either to recharge it or simply to protect it.

The Knightscope K5 may not have managed to adapt to the New York subway, but it has already proved its worth in Los Angeles, where it has been patrolling certain neighborhoods since 2022.

For the New York City Police Department (NYPD), the Knightscope K5 may have completed its pilot project, but that’s not the end of robots in the city. The NYPD intends to continue using Digidog, a version of Boston Dynamics’ famous four-legged robot Spot, and StarChase’s Guardian HX, a portable GPS launcher capable of sending GPS tags to vehicles, even when moving, so that police can keep track of them. – AFP Relaxnews