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Airbus Steps Up Push for Flying Taxis, On-Demand Helicopters (bloomberg.com)
The future of transportation may not be on the roads but the skies. That might not be a reality quite yet but Airbus is taking it seriously. The company is settng up a division for flying cars and on-demand taxis. From a report: Airbus SE is creating a division to oversee futuristic transport options such as flying taxis and on-demand helicopters in a sign the European planemaker is going on the offensive against tech providers and startups encroaching in the market. The manufacturer named company veteran Eduardo Dominguez Puerta, 40, on Monday to head its newly formed Urban Air Mobility unit. Puerta helped start the firm's innovation center in Silicon Valley, where he served as chief operating officer. Projects that will be overseen by the division include an autonomous flying cab prototype called CityAirbus, an electric flying taxi named Vahana and Voom, billed by Airbus as a premier on-demand helicopter booking platform. Ride-hailing app creator Uber Technologies and startup Kitty Hawk, backed by Google's co-founder Larry Page, are also working to develop airborne taxis.
You can already do that with small propeller airplanes. Getting a licence is not that hard for a motivated terrorist. And ultralights (which nowadays are pretty similar to "real" propeller aircraft) are even easier.
Speaking of "some ridiculous contraptions with folding wings", Boeing has the 777X with retractable wing tips.
>> Airbus SE is creating a division to oversee futuristic transport options...against tech providers and startups encroaching in the market...Silicon Valley
In other words, Airbus is hoping to part a few "venture capitalists" and "angel investors" from their liquid funds. Not a bad idea, and probably morality-neutral since the same folks would probably otherwise "invest" their money in flying cars from firms that don't actually build flying things.
First of all, forget "flying cars" and especially "autonomous" ones - not going to happen for decades if ever.
Helicopter "Uber", yes, they exist, but it requires special conditions....
https://phys.org/news/2017-07-...
"The city, which sits in a state of the same name whose population exceeds 45 million, has the biggest fleet of helicopters in the world...700 choppers, or nearly a third of Brazil's total number, are located there, alongside 528 helipads.
You would NOT get away with this today in New York, London or Paris...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
"Such things do not exist. We have had helicopters for a few decades now, some ridiculous contraptions with folding wings, and jetpacks. But, not flying cars."
From TFS, "The future of transportation may not be on the roads but the skies. That might not be a reality quite yet but Airbus is taking it seriously."
That's been covered already.
"We do not have the technology for that, and we are not likely to have it any time soon. So please stop pushing this flying cars nonsense."
The Harrier Jump Jet ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... ) has been around for over half a century. The technology for flying cars is well within reach. The only obstacles we have are scaling prices down to reasonable levels for civilian ownership of such vehicles and figuring out a way to make mass aerial transit not the massive hazard it potentially is.
I ignore Anonymous Coward posts. If you want to discuss something, that's awesome. Log in.
There are flying cars -- Google Terrafugia.for one example.
Problem is that they are expensive, require a pilots license, aren't energy efficient. They look to be mediocre aircraft and worse cars. But the prototype Terrafugia flies and drives well enough for a lot of folks to believe they will actually ship vehicles within perhaps 18 months. There are other projects, some at least somewhat credible.
It's also true that those with a money can take helicopter taxi services to a few airports -- e.g $99 for Manhattan to JFK (vs less than $10 by rail).
Personally, I suspect that the need for dedicated helipads, dubious fuel economy, questionable safety, need for Air Traffic Control on a scale many orders of magnitude greater than any ever implemented, etc are likely to keep "flying cars" pretty much a thing of the future for many decades or, quite likely, centuries.
You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
Yep, security is going to be a serious concern. The big problem is that a "flying car" can start its mission as a car and very likely take to the air far closer to potential targets than a conventional aircraft would be allowed to fly.
You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
There's no way physics is going to be able to solve this problem. I was woken up this morning by a helicopter flying around. It was very irritating and not like an airplane. The stupid thing was hovering. They can't even solve the problem of noisy drones.
The Harrier Jump Jet has been around for over half a century. The technology for flying cars is well within reach
Sigh... I don't know if you are trolling or stupid. We do not have any technology (nor any reasonably likely near term technology) for power sources with sufficient power density (power to weight) to enable a usable flying car. If you think any part of that sentence is wrong then you do not adequately understand physics enough to be a part of this conversation.
The Harrier jet in no way shape or form resembles a flying car nor is the technology in a Harrier jet scalable down to enable one. Do you have any idea how big one of these things is? How much fuel it consumes? Do you comprehend how much maintenance there is for such a device? How much infrastructure is required to maintain one? Where do you plan to land it aside from an airport? Why not save money and just buy/rent a plane and a car both of which can do more and cost less? This is not technology that can be scaled down to the size of a family sedan even if we ignore the legion of other problems. Your argument is as absurd as saying we're going to have a moon colony soon because we've managed to have a few men walk there.
The only obstacles we have are scaling prices down to reasonable levels for civilian ownership of such vehicles and figuring out a way to make mass aerial transit not the massive hazard it potentially is.
Ok you are actually retarded if you think it's that simple. Here are just a few of the showstopper problems preventing flying cars. This list isn't even close to complete but every item on it is a showstopper.
1) No power source with adequate power to weight ratio nor any prospect of one
2) No adequately robust navigation/piloting system for aerial transit by non-pilots
3) Very few people are adequately trained pilots
4) No infrastructure for takeoff/landing anywhere except existing airports
5) It's cheaper to have a plane and a car than one that does both
6) A purpose built plane or car will outperform a vehicle that does both
7) No obvious economic problem solved by a flying car
8) Any vehicle light enough to get off the ground is too fragile to endure traveling on the ground
9) Enormous and unresolved liability issues in the event of accidents
10) Cost of fuel will be prohibitive for anyone but the richest of individuals
11) Cost of maintenance will be prohibitive
Flying cars will always be just for the rich, because if they ever became popular most of the advantages would go away. Air traffic can't be nearly as dense as surface traffic.
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SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
It looks like small short-range electric and hybrid fixed-wing aircraft will be the vanguard of the coming revolution in autonomous electric aircraft. Teslarati has a good rundown of the players in that space. (IMHO the all-electric Eviation prototype is beautiful.)
The energy density of lithium cells is terrible compared to liquid hydrocarbon fuels, but the simplicity, reliability and lower operating cost of an electric motor and batteries over a combustion engine is the driver. They might never compete with turbojets for long-distance flights, but they can still capture a large proportion of the market by dominating shorter range commutes.
Ceci n'est pas une signature.
Just like automakers they're getting a foot in the door ahead of their competition without any real expectations of actually producing anything.
I would say one key difference in practice is tolerance of poor maintenance.
In a car with poor maintenance and upkeep, you end up on the side of the road.
In an aircraft with poor maintenance, you die.
Of course this is not a common criteria, for flying cars people generally think about it being street legal and able to fly/land wherever. By that criteria, the helicopter can't do a grocery trip, at least not by itself, the last mile would have to be some other vehicle.
Guess the short of it is multi-motor, multi-rotor aircraft are going to be needed for the common slack user to be safer, and for it to tolerate moter/rotor failures and compensate.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
That and $10/minute operating costs.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
As opposed to the cheap, discount helicopter booking platforms.
Just the washing instructions on life's rich tapestry
That's nice, after reading your post I know for certain that you're an asshole.
Grow up. If you post something that stupid and easily disproved be prepared to take some heat for it. Honestly I still don't know if you are an idiot or a troll so I'm not going to respond after this.
This is your only valid point. I absently didn't think about fuel when I made my post.
If you think that is the only valid point then you don't understand what you are talking about.
I covered that here. "The only obstacles we have are scaling prices down to reasonable levels for civilian ownership of such vehicles"
That claim is preposterously wrong. We don't have the technology nor any plausible means to develop such technology within our lifetime. The physics doesn't work and the economics of it don't work. Unless you have a design for Tony Stark's arc reactor that you are hiding you aren't going to see a flying car any time soon.
I used the Harrier as an example as it can take off and land vertically.
And it was a stupid example. Harrier VTOL technology cannot practically be used elsewhere. It's akin to saying we should start transporting cargo via scaled down Saturn V rockets instead of using cargo ships. If it were economically practical to scale down for civilian use it would have been already.
Roads cost money. Traffic costs money.
The roads already exist and so does the infrastructure to handle them. Whether you understand it or not you are suggesting ripping out a huge portion of that for no apparent economic benefit. If you can actually develop a practical flying car then you can argue with me about the economics of overhauling our entire road system.
I don't think you are aware of how much planes weigh. A fully loaded Cessna weighs 2,550 lb which is the weight of a small car and that's not a heavy plane by any standards.
Seriously, just stop. It's not how much the vehicle weighs. It's how much the vehicle can carry safely and how expensive it is to carry it. A fully loaded Cessna 172 has enough power to get itself aloft along with typically around 600-700lbs of cargo and/or passengers. You can put it over the weight limit with as little as three passengers and a full tank of gas in some circumstances. Even the most basic automobile sold today can safely handle more weight than that and it doesn't have to land at an airport to do it. Nor does a car have to carry around heavy and impractical wings while driving. What magical technology are you imagining that will allow you to make the vehicle robust enough to drive on a road while still remaining airworthy without using up the entire weight budget?
Maintenance isn't that high on small planes.
HAHAHAHA... You haven't ever actually owned a small plane have you? They are stupidly expensive to maintain even for a little two seat Cessna. It's not unusal for them to cost hundreds of dollars per operating hour not including the cost of the vehicle itself. Something that would be a practical flying car would cost considerably more unless you invoke science fiction level advances in our technology.
Having reading difficulties there? The nonsense is continuing to hang the flying car tag on contraptions that are essentially helicopters or little airplanes with folding wings. Flying cars like in, say, Blade Runner, Back to the Future or The Fifth Element? Forget it. Like many have already explained, we do not have the technology, and we are not going to have it any time soon. Chances are that, in 50 years time, such flying cars will still be in the realm of science-fiction. And people will still be coming up with rather ridiculous vehicles, that will mostly get nowhere, and attempt to push them as flying cars. By all means, we should attempt to solve the associated problems. What we shouldn't do is pretend that we have already solved them.
As a commercial helicopter pilot, I think it's pretty funny that so many people think flying cars don't exist... The helicopter I fly is an AS350-B3 Eurocopter:
There, you said it yourself: it's a helicopter, not a flying car. You are of course free to call it a flying car, but that will not change what it really is.
nt
There are flying cars
There are roadable planes; a "flying car" will look more like a submarine.
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