San Francisco, May 8 (AFP\/APP): As urban traffic gets more miserable, entrepreneurs are looking to a future in which commuters hop into “air taxis” that whisk them over clogged roads.<\/p>\n
Companies such as Archer, Joby and Wisk are working on electric-powered aircraft that take off and land vertically like helicopters then propel forward like planes.<\/p>\n
“‘The Jetsons’ is definitely a reference that people make a lot when trying to contextualize what we are doing,” Archer Vice President Louise Bristow told AFP, referring to a 1960s animated comedy about a family living in a high-tech future.<\/p>\n
“The easiest way to think about it is a flying car, but that’s not what we’re doing.”<\/p>\n
What Archer envisions is an age of aerial ride-sharing, an “Uber or Lyft of the skies,” Bristow said.<\/p>\n
Neighborhood parking garage rooftops or shopping mall lots could serve as departure or arrival pads for electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft.<\/p>\n
Commuters would make it the rest of the way however they wish, even synching trips with car rideshare services such as Uber which owns a stake in Santa Cruz, California-based Joby.<\/p>\n
Joby executives said on a recent earnings call that its first production model aircraft should be in the skies later this year.<\/p>\n
That comes despite a Joby prototype crashing early this year while being tested at speeds and altitudes far greater than it would have to handle as part of an air taxi fleet.<\/p>\n
Joby has declined to discuss details of the remotely piloted aircraft’s crash, which occurred in an uninhabited area, saying it is waiting for US aviation regulators to finish an investigation.<\/p>\n
“We were at the end of the flight test expansion campaign at test points well above what we expect to see in normal operations,” Joby executive chairman Paul Sciarra told analysts.<\/p>\n
“I’m really excited about where we are right now; we have demonstrated the full performance of our aircraft.”<\/p>\n
Its eVTOL aircraft have a maximum range of 150 miles (241 kilometers), a top speed of 200 miles per hour and a “low noise profile” to avoid an annoying din, the company said.<\/p>\n
Joby has announced partnerships with SK Telecom and the TMAP mobility platform in South Korea to provide emissions-free aerial ridesharing.<\/p>\n
“By cooperating with Joby, TMAP will become a platform operator that can offer a seamless transportation service between the ground and the sky,” TMAP chief executive Lee Jong Ho said in a release.<\/p>\n
Joby has also announced a partnership with Japanese airline ANA to launch air taxi service in Japan.<\/p>\n
And Toyota has additionally joined the alliance, with an aim to explore adding ground transportation to such a service there, Joby said.<\/p>\n
– Rethinking required –<\/p>\n
Hurdles on the path include establishing infrastructure and adapting attitudes to make air taxis a part of everyday life.<\/p>\n
“For mass adoption, people need to have a mindset change,” Bristow said.
\n“Getting people to want to travel in a different way will take some rethinking.”<\/p>\n
The need for the change, though, is clear, she reasoned.<\/p>\n
Roads are congested with traffic that wastes time, frays nerves and spews pollution.<\/p>\n
“There is nowhere else for traffic to go,” Bristow said.
\n“You have to go up.”<\/p>\n
Miami and Los Angeles are already exploring the potential of aerial ridesharing, and Archer is hoping to have a small air taxi service operating in at least one of those cities by the end of 2024.<\/p>\n
“It’s a monumental task that we’re taking on,” Bristow said.<\/p>\n
“It’s going to take a while before the infrastructure supports the mass expansion of what we’re trying to do.”<\/p>\n
Archer last month announced that it teamed with United Airlines to create an eVTOL advisory committee.<\/p>\n
The US airline has pre-ordered 200 Archer aircraft with an eye toward using them for “last-mile” transportation from airports, Bristow told AFP.<\/p>\n
“Imagine flying from London to Newark, New Jersey, then getting in an Archer and being deposited somewhere in Manhattan,” Bristow said.<\/p>\n
– More time for life –<\/p>\n
Silicon Valley startup Xwing specializes in making standard aircraft capable of flying safely without pilots, with an aim of turning commuting by air into a cheaper and more efficient way to travel.<\/p>\n
“We’re strong believers here that the industry is going through a pretty dramatic transformation,” Xwing chief and founder Marc Piette told AFP.
\n“In a few years you’ll start seeing taxi networks of electric aircrafts regionally or on long hauls and it’s going to be quite a different landscape.”<\/p>\n
Thousands of regional airports used mostly for recreation could become part of aerial commute networks, air mobility consultant Scott Drennan told AFP.<\/p>\n
To Drennan, the primary reason for taking to the skies is to “give people back their time.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
San Francisco, May 8 (AFP\/APP): As urban traffic gets more miserable, entrepreneurs are looking to a future in which commuters hop into “air taxis” that whisk them over clogged roads. Companies such as Archer, Joby and Wisk are working on electric-powered aircraft that take off […]<\/p>\n
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