Slashdot Mirror
Boeing CEO: First Operational Self-Flying Cars Are Less Than 5 Years Out (geekwire.com)
Speaking at the GeekWire Summit, Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg said the company is making rapid progress on the first operational self-driving airborne vehicles and that we could see them take to the skies in under five years. "Muilenburg laid out the company's vision for flying cars, as well as the importance of safety measures for the concept," reports GeekWire. "Muilenburg said the company is already building prototypes and expects them to fly within the year." From the report: "Imagine a future city that has three-dimensional highways, with flying taxis, flying cars," Muilenburg said. "That future is not that far away. In fact we are building the prototype vehicles today. We are also investing in the ecosystem that will allow that to operate safely and reliably as it must." The full vision of self-flying cars ferrying people through busy urban areas will take longer than five years to realize, Muilenburg said, but vehicles that start with more simple functions like cargo aren't far away.
The ecosystem to manage this new method of travel includes enhanced air traffic control. Earlier this year, Boeing teamed up with Austin-based SparkCognition to develop artificial intelligence and blockchain technologies for tracking and directing flying cars through traffic corridors. Muilenburg wouldn't say where these futuristic vessels would be tested, though he did say that the environment would be a "similar case" to Airbus' Vahana flying-taxi testing ground in Pendleton, Ore. Testing self-flying cars requires dedicated airspace and a slate of approvals from the Federal Aviation Administration.
The ecosystem to manage this new method of travel includes enhanced air traffic control. Earlier this year, Boeing teamed up with Austin-based SparkCognition to develop artificial intelligence and blockchain technologies for tracking and directing flying cars through traffic corridors. Muilenburg wouldn't say where these futuristic vessels would be tested, though he did say that the environment would be a "similar case" to Airbus' Vahana flying-taxi testing ground in Pendleton, Ore. Testing self-flying cars requires dedicated airspace and a slate of approvals from the Federal Aviation Administration.
People already can't drive with wheels on the road, just think of the danger once they get airborne. Am I suppose to turn first, or do you? Just imagine all the ground injuries.
No one reads the manual.
They've had operational flying cars since before I was born.
Making it operate is not the problem with the Jetsons fantasy.
I don't want a self flying car, I want to fly that fucker myself, and if it could be the shape of a spitfire that would just be tops.
Wanna buy a shirt?
https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
Flying cars are not ever going to be mainstream. The problem isn't who operates them (humans or machines), even, though human drivers can't even handle two dimensional operations reliably so I would be terrified of the average driver today having to deal with three dimensions. No, the problem is the energy cost of getting a car in the air in the first place. I don't see a reasonable solution to that problem coming any time soon unless we discover some heretofore unknown magical method of doing antigravity or something like that. In general, it's far more economical to keep general transportation using traditional ground transport simply because you necessarily remove the cost of lifting and then lowering again the cargo and vehicle.
That's not to say that rich people won't have flying cars. I mean, they may be a bit more practical and helicpoters assuming they ever work. That's assuming they aren't already helicopters....
If it works in theory, try something else in practice.
Your idiot neighbor having one of these.
The noise of these things flying over your house. day and night.
The 3 dimensional zoning debates. And lawsuits.
The amount of energy this needs, just while we try to reduce our energy footprint.
The pollution this generates right where it causes the most problems, in busy urban areas. The levels of energy required can only be achieved by burning something. crudely.
Don't get me wrong, flying cars would be great, in a Jetson style future. But in our overpopulated world I associate them with the more bleak and dystopian images of the future that some science-fiction paints.
Flying cars may happen in 5 years but they'll just be toys for the mega rich and won't be allowed to go anywhere that a helicopter can't anyway due to civil regs and noise issues. This is nothing more than Boeing pumping its share price. Again.
OK, now I know this is complete marketing B.S. (look, I'm being nice!). There is no reasonable use of "Blockchain" in "Directing Traffic and Tracking Vehicles". That is utter and complete nonsense.
Just call it, "Blockety McBlockFace" and be done with it. F.F.S. (see, I'm being nice again).
They're literally available now. It's called "helicopter with autopilot". Problem being that autopilot still needs someone to give it orders and troubleshoot potential problems, which is solved with introduction of "pilot" into the system. Not to mention space needed for take-off and landing, and that elephant in the room called "costs".
Pretty much all major aerospace companies that function in helicopter sector have their version of a "flying car". Essentially all of them are light helicopters of some kind. Bell and Airbus talked and to a limited extent demonstrated their ambitions recently. I guess this is Boeing's declaration that they also have a foot in the potential market.
Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg said the company is making rapid progress on the first operational self-driving airborne vehicles and that we could see them take to the skies in under five years.
Note the use of the word "vehicles" not the word "cars". We already have operational self-driving airborne vehicles. They're called drones and we've been doing them for quite a while now. Not a single one of them resembles what we call cars nor are they useful for that purpose. We also have transportation vehicles for people to fly in but they are called airplanes and helicopters and they aren't going to drive on our roads. If it doesn't drive on a road by definition it is not a car. If they want to developed a vehicle that doesn't require a human pilot yet is safe to fly people around that's great but then just say that. They aren't working on flying cars because flying cars are impossible with any technology we currently or are likely to possess any time soon. And even if the technology was worked out the economics of it make it an absurd proposition. Operating any vehicle that flies is going to be VASTLY more expensive than almost any vehicle that doesn't for all but a handful of corner cases.
"Imagine a future city that has three-dimensional highways, with flying taxis, flying cars," Muilenburg said. "That future is not that far away. In fact we are building the prototype vehicles today. We are also investing in the ecosystem that will allow that to operate safely and reliably as it must."
Has there been some magical breakthrough in power density that I'm not aware of? Because unless we have invented the equivalent of Tony Stark's arc reactor we aren't going to have flying cars. Muilenburg's statement is the sort of marketing BS you would expect from a company that makes aircraft. Saying they are "building the protoype vehicles today" is a content free statement. Ford built a nuclear powered prototype car back in the 1950s and yet I don't see them at dealerships curiously.
Also the word taxi has NOTHING to do with any specific type of vehicle. Any type of vehicle can be a taxi because taxi is by definition a vehicle hired for transport. A 747 can be a taxi. So can a boat, a helicopter, a bicycle, and yes a car. Taxi is a service not a specific type of vehicle. Airplanes and helicopters are used as taxis today. Whether or not they are piloted by a human or a computer is irrelevant.
"artificial intelligence and blockchain technologies" = Fully autonomous self-lying cars.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
What part of "self-flying" did you not understand?
Doesn't matter. You're worrying about the wrong thing. Vehicles that don't need humans to operate them safely are arguably a good idea. Frankly piloting vehicles (cars, planes, boats, etc) is a waste of human time and ability for the most part. If we can develop computers that can do the job better then that's great.
What gets lost in these discussions is the fact that even if we develop planes that can fly themselves it isn't going to change the economics of operating an aircraf of any description dramatically. Replacing a human pilot with a computer doesn't suddenly make planes affordable to the common man. The cost of the pilot is almost a rounding error in the cost of owning and operating any flying vehicle. You have the purchase cost, maintenance, storage, inspections, insurance, fuel, financing, and more which together VASTLY outstrip the cost of the pilot. Replacing a human pilot with a computer doesn't change most of those costs much if at all.
Why would they need to be especially good at either?
That's not the problem. The problem is that any design we can actually build are REALLY BAD at both. To get the thing aloft you have to strip out vast amounts of weight and even then we can only just barely get them airborne with limited cargo capacity. They are so light and fragile you can't really drive them on the road safely. Even a minor fender bender renders them no longer airworthy. When they are on the ground you have to lug around heavy impractical wings and in the air you have to lug around heavy impractical drivetrains. They're bad on fuel economy, fragile, expensive, can barely carry any cargo, can't land or take off anywhere useful, slow, loud, uncomfortable, etc.
The ONLY way a flying car could be practical is if we had a breakthrough power supply. Think Tony Stark's arc reactor made real. No internal combustion engine, no EV tech, no fuel cell tech, nor any other power source we have or are in any danger of making can generate enough power while being light enough to make flying cars a practical reality either technically or economically.
A flying car is certainly for a completely different context than most planes and as a car it would would only need to offer an adequate experience as any trips of significant length
Not when it's cheaper to buy both a plane and a car than a combination vehicle that does both activities worse for more money. Even if we ignore all the technical problems with flying cars (which are legion) the economics of them immediately make them non-viable.
(like the commute from the burbs to major urban areas for work) would likely be done in the air.
Umm, where do you think you are going to land this thing? It isn't going to be landing on 5th avenue on NYC. You have to land at an airport and drive from there. And if you are going to do that then you might as well just fly a real plane and own/rent a real car. You're not really thinking the problem through. Even if we somehow managed to figure out the technical and economic problems with flying cars (which we won't) we would have to make VAST changes to our infrastructure to be able to use them anywhere except flying to/from airports. You're not going to land a flying car in the parking lot of your local mega-mart and you sure as hell aren't flying one into a dense urban area.
Any form of heavier-than-air flying is much more energy intensive than surface transportation
Probably. It depends on how high up you go, how far you're going, and what traffic is like in between.
and can only realistically be powered with hydrocarbon fuel.
Completely false. We already have prototypes of autonomous air taxis that can travel for fifteen minutes plus on a charge. That's plenty of time to make short trips.
I trust that Slashdot readers are educated enough to understand that all those battery powered electric multicopters for personal transport
...already exist.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Till they get anti-gravity. Pushing enough air down to lift a person up makes a lot of noise.
That's why claiming Boeing is working on "flying cars" is a lot of "bullshit". They aren't. They're working on air taxis. They will have all the same restrictions as helicopters, but they won't have a pilot. None of them are going to be singlecopters, either, nor run on fossil fuels. They will all be battery multicopters. That makes them quieter than helis at all times, so while they still won't be fit to take off from driveways, they will be able to take off from more locations.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"