Chicago has finally found something it won’t tolerate.
Not crime. Not dysfunction. Not the kind of bureaucratic paralysis that makes glaciers look impulsive. No, the line has been drawn at food delivery robots. Two of them destroy two bus shelters in two weeks and the full machinery of civic panic roars to life.
But I can’t help but think, “Have you met the Chicago I’ve come to know and love?”
Because from where I’m sitting, these robots, aside from a little collateral damage, are already outperforming their Windy City Homo Sapiens counterparts by the kind of margin the White Sox like to lose by.
Let’s start with the basics. These robots move at five miles per hour. They don’t drink. They don’t text. They don’t take bribes. They don’t decide that, halfway through an intersection, a red light is more of a philosophical suggestion than a statutory requirement.
What’s their biggest crime? Driving into stationary objects? If that’s the bar, then we’re going to have to shut down half the goddamn city.
Please spare me the horror stories. Yes, Chicago sidewalks now contain the occasional confused robot. But in Paris, motorcyclists avoid traffic jams by running down sidewalk pedestrians, beeping their tiny little horns as if it’s a festive parade instead of a felony.
So, the real threat is a glorified cooler on wheels with sad eyes? Critics warn of worst-case scenarios. They always do. So let’s take them seriously because I always do.
So what if a delivery bot pushes a wheelchair-bound citizen into the path of an oncoming bus—that might be equally as robotic. Progress waits for no one. There. Mayor Daley the Elder would’ve been proud of the way we just addressed it. And quite frankly, it still sounds far more coordinated than the average Monday morning Dan Ryan commute.
Which brings us to our only obvious conclusion. Chicago should be going all in on this program starting with the City Council.
I’m not asking for sophisticated AI. Just give me a Roomba with a voting button. At least it would occasionally clean something up while it wanders around the chamber in aimless circles.
Could a robot vacuum possibly do worse than Byron Sigcho-Lopez—a name that invokes images of city council meetings reduced to performance art? I’m confident the bot would show more consistency, fewer ideological detours, and a noticeable reduction in theatrical outrage.
Not to mention that saying the city council “sucks” would have an entirely different meaning.
But let’s not stop there. Let’s expand the program into law enforcement.
Littering? Ticket.
Jaywalking? Ticket.
Standing around thinking about jaywalking or littering? Preemptive ticket. We’d eliminate the deficit by lunchtime.
Need parking enforcement? Done. These robots don’t get bored, don’t take breaks, and they don’t mysteriously disappear whenever a double-parked SUVs with tinted windows appears.
Public transit? Replace CTA supervisors with robots and see if it gets worse. The trains might still be late, unclean, and unsafe, but at least the excuses would be far more consistent.
Have you seen the video of Figure 03 accompanying Melania Trump into the East Room like someone skipped the user agreement and clicked “Install Update?”
I’ve watched it three times and I still can’t tell which one’s the robot. If the entity gliding into the room like it’s contractually prohibited from showing emotion while modeling a coat that costs more than the average Chicago property tax increase is the robot, then we’ve reached the point where you can’t tell the difference. Which, frankly, makes Chicago’s little sidewalk Roombas look refreshingly honest by comparison.
Here’s what everyone’s missing. These delivery robots aren’t failing. They’re learning. And in a city where humans seem committed to repeating the same mistakes with an uncanny religious zeal, the idea of something that improves over time should be cause for celebration, not fear and loathing.
Yes, a robot hit a bus shelter. Then another robot hit another bus shelter. Meanwhile, entire City departments hit that same wall years ago and they just keep hitting the accelerator.
So let the robots roll. Let them bump into things. Let them figure it out. Perhaps they could do us a favor by taking out that insipid Bat Column sculpture. The Picasso monstrosity is difficult enough to explain without having to defend a Louisville Slugger as art.
Because if the choice is between a system that occasionally breaks glass and one that consistently breaks everything else, I’m taking the robot.
At least it knows when it’s run into something.
