NASA Wants You To Fly The Highway In The Sky

rakerman writes "NASA is working on a program called SATS, the Small Aircraft Transportation System, which is designed to improve the automation and safety of small aircraft travel to the point where you could fly the 'highway in the sky' as easily as you drive your car." I'm ready -- when is the Moller Skycar?

Comments

Don't get so excited...

[Jace of Fuse!]

If I'm understanding this correctly -- even if it ever becomes a reality it won't be so much like everyone having their own personal flying aircraft as much as smaller commuter type services or the like. Instead of huge passenger jets that are best suited for flights over long distances, this sort of thing would be useful in small towns outside of larger cities requiring people to do more than an hours worth of driving to get to work every day. Not only would it reduce that but it would also increase the distance one could live from work. Instead of driving to work, or riding a bus every day, they simply swing down to the nearby landing strip and catch a ride on the next flight.

It seems like an obvious evolution in our transportation systems, really, since long commutes are getting more and more common and traffic is constantly getting worse.

hmm environment?

[jilles]

It is bad enough to have regular airplanes burning thousands of tons of kerosine in our atmosphere every day. The effect of millions of cars burning extra fuel to stay airborne in addition to getting from A to B would be disastrous IMHO.

Then there's the issue of horizon pollution, imagine sitting in your backyard unable to escape the trafic that is passing right over it. In my country (The Netherlands) it is already hard to find a place where you can't see/hear regular trafic.

Then there's the issue of accidents and their consequences. Apart from probably being fatal for the people inside the flying car, heavy objects dropping from the sky may pose a danger themselves as well.