Travelling to new places is great! The actual travelling, however, can be a royal pain. With carrying all your luggage, the stress of possibly losing that luggage, waiting in long lines to check it, then waiting in the long security lines… But there is a light at the end of that dim tunnel. The hassle of having to haul your luggage through the airport and waiting to get it checked may soon disappear. SITA, a Swiss company, is currently testing out their latest invention Leo the luggage robot.
When you arrive at the airport Leo will zip right up to you, scan your ticket, print the luggage tag, open the doors for you to place your luggage, and whisk it away to your terminal. With this automated process it significantly reduces the risk of your luggage being lost. Not to mention it frees up some space in the terminal. Fantastic!
In theory, Leo sounds like it is going to be a game changer. However, there are some flaws to the Robo Luggage carrier worth mentioning. For instance, Leo is designed to only carry two pieces of luggage at a time. I don’t know about you, but on some trips I carry enough luggage that may or may not contain enough clothing to cover a small town. Not to mention the dozens of other people entering the airport with all of their bags. There would have to be quite a few Leo’s to keep up with the volume. It’s enough with trying to dodge the occasional rogue child running through the airport let alone trying to avoid all the robots that would be zipping around. I’m fairly certain it would be like playing Frogger on expert.
Now it’s not to say Leo is a bad idea. He would work great for the elderly or folks who have disabilities.
But as for now, while SITA is on the right track to making travelling easier, I don’t think that they are quite there. So, for now, it seems that we will be trapped in the endless hell of the checked baggage lines.
