Parking cubed

By: Simon Warburton - 28 September 2010 16:28

GM recently provided a fascinating glimpse into what the auto future could look like with its Jiao, Miao and Xiao concept vehicles that are currently a star turn at the Shanghai Expo.

Director of advanced technology vehicle concepts Christopher Borroni-Bird outlined a futuristic vision of what cars might do as urban environments became ever-more congested - particularly in he so-called 'mega-cities' of Asia.

Well, it seems the future may be closer than we think.

Birmingham has developed an ingenious wheeze to solve a car parking problem - that had otherwise threatened a series of shop frontages.

Motorists simply drive into a what is described as a lift and their car spun around before being moved to a remote parking spot.

It's all a bit unclear how the owner retreats from the lift or indeed, how the car is retrieved, but fair play to Birmingham for coming up with a seemingly brilliant parking solution.