Why you won’t be flying in a taxi anytime soon
The idea is certainly audacious: thwart traffic in congested cities by flying over it. Quick, quiet, clean, cheap. This concept — which requires a new type of battery-powered vertical takeoff and landing vehicle (VTOL) — is Silicon Valley to its core in terms of self-liberation and greater efficiency. These electric vehicles would operate from “vertiports” situated around urban areas, predominantly atop buildings. And, at some point, they would be unmanned.
Uber Technologies disclosed the initial steps of its air-travel vision this week, announcing five partner companies with specialties aimed at making the sci-fi staple affordable and common. The initial testing is expected in 2020 in Dallas and Dubai, two car-clogged cities where aviation interests wield great influence.
“If you’re not planting the seeds for five, 10 years out, you have no company in five to 10 years,” said Jeff Holden, Uber’s chief product officer.
Plenty of startups want to hasten the day when we all have a flying car, but Uber and its partners see an air taxi as the logical first step. The company released a white paper in October to discuss its views of on-demand urban air transportation.
Yet even with a limited foray into the world of George Jetson and Blade Runner, it’s hard to overstate how many fundamental achievements must occur first, on regulatory and technical grounds.
No one has built a craft of the sort Uber envisions, much less one that flies three or four people quietly on batteries powering multiple propulsive rotors. Battery technology has years of advances to go in order to become smaller and lighter, two attributes critical for an efficient VTOL.
Even the simple matter of naming these things isn’t that simple after all. A flying car? Nope, the future multi-rotor craft will not even be close to an automobile. Nor is it a smaller, more technologically-advanced helicopter. And whatever the consensus on nomenclature, given the expense — Uber suggests a long-term cost around $200,000 — it’s unlikely large numbers of motorists will be trading in their ground cars for flying transport. In fact, at first these vehicles may be too exotic even for sky tripping taxi fleets. To make it a service for the masses, an air shuttle seems more apt for cheaper fares.
And any new aircraft design will in turn require new standards, new regulations, new government certifications of those standards, as well as software testing since programs will be needed to help fly the aircraft.
Despite daunting challenges and unanswered questions, the usual suspects are lining up. Textron’s Bell Helicopter sees the business as one that could lead to a new product line, begun with hybrid motors before morphing into fully-electric designs. Embraer, which, like Bell, manufactures both civilian and military aircraft, is also hoping to supply VTOLs, along with future generations of computer “fly-by-wire” technologies needed to make these aircraft work without pilots.
The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration is keen to be seen as helpful, noting in a statement that it is working on automation systems for unmanned aerial vehicles. That technology could one day have a place in the VTOL world. “Several areas need further research, particularly identifying the operational risks, making sure the automation that ‘flies’ the autonomous vehicle is safe, and how the automation will interact with the air traffic control system,” the FAA said in a statement in response to queries.
A VTOL flight also presents practical considerations: most buildings locate their entrances on ground level, which could complicate the arrival of people landing on the roof. Many older buildings will have to retrofit their roofs while some new buildings will require landing pads.
Uber says its goal is to make the cost of urban air transport, when pooling riders, comparable to its lower-cost UberX ground service. Holden said that over time, the cost of flying by VTOL will become lower than the “variable costs” of owning a car, such as insurance, tolls, maintenance and fuel.