By Frank Giles

Have you ever heard the phrase, “Don’t reinvent the wheel?” Sounds like sound advice, right? Well don’t tell that to the people at Goodyear Tire because they are, in fact, reinventing the wheel. With all of the advances in automotive technology taking place these days, it’s difficult to not be excited about the future, but these new spherical tires by Goodyear might be the coolest thing to happen to cars since GPS navigation. That’s right, I said spherical tires!

Goodyear has come up with a concept of a spherical, all rubber tire that can move in any direction. The Eagle 360 tires will be designed for self-driving cars (also cool) and instead of using axles, they will be supported by magnetic levitation. Does this mean the car would be floating on air? Yep! This would make it the smoothest ride in town.

How does this affect parking? These cars would be able to fit into super-tight spaces, even driving sideways to get in or out as needed. We don’t know when these new tires will be available–it may be awhile–but for certain, our industry will have to maintain the same level of innovation as the cars we park.

Frank Giles is area manager with Lanier Parking Solutions, Atlanta.