How airships could reduce Valley traffic congestion
Anyone who travels through Lehigh County is familiar with traffic congestion, particularly on Interstate 78, Route 22 and other major thoroughfares. Most of us have experienced the daily frustrations and stress of clogged roadways, slow traffic and crumbling infrastructure.
One cause of local traffic congestion is the growth of large distribution centers — operated by Amazon, Walmart, Uline, and others — which have increased the number of 18-wheelers on our roads.
Lehigh County is such an attractive location for warehouses because shipments trucked from here can reach more than one-third of U.S. consumers within a single day. That’s great for e-commerce customers and our local economy, but it does harm our quality of life.
Our traffic problems will only worsen unless we take steps now to find new, effective solutions. A wide range of possibilities exist, but one intriguing option that may be a good fit isn’t getting as much attention as it should.
Let’s take a closer look at this thinking-outside-the-box alternative: airships.
The time-worn solutions to easing road congestion have been to build more roads or widen them, to repair or upgrade bridges and other infrastructure, and to improve and expand public transportation. Unfortunately, building more roads or widening them does not actually alleviate congestion.
The good news is that recent technological advances have made a new public transportation and cargo option viable: airships. Although these technologies are new, using lighter-than-air airships as a mode of transportation has a long history.
Two images usually come to mind when you think of airships: the Goodyear blimp serenely floating over sporting events, and the 1937 newsreel footage of the luxury airship Hindenburg catching fire and crashing in Lakehurst, New Jersey, which effectively ended the age of commercial airship passenger transport.
By incorporating new technologies, safe, energy-efficient airships are poised to make a remarkable comeback for passenger air travel and as a freight shipping solution.
New-generation airships are nearly ready to join the commercial aviation
market, either as standard or luxury transportation. They would be effective alternatives on short regional sectors, carrying as many as 200 passengers.
They could help fill in public transportation gaps for Lehigh County, making traveling from Allentown to Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, New York, and other destinations easier and quicker than current options — and at a price competitive with railroad and airline fares.
Airships can also move freight on passenger flights, cargo-only flights or combined passenger-cargo flights.
For example, one airship model can be configured to carry either 200 passengers; 48 passengers and 27.5 tons of cargo; or 55 tons of cargo.
As a comparison, an 18-wheeler’s maximum load is about 22.5 tons. Using airships to ship cargo could take tractor-trailers off our roads, a big plus for our quality of life.
Several companies — notably HAV, Lockhead, and AtlasLAS — are developing airships for commercial, freight and hybrid passenger-freight service that will be ready to launch within the next three to 10 years.
Using airships for public transportation and freight may seem too futuristic and a bit unsettling, but it’s not. Modern airships use helium rather than hydrogen for buoyancy. It’s not flammable, so there’s no danger of the lighter-than-air gas fueling a fire.
Many new airship models are hybrid designs that don’t require much helium or a constant supply to stay afloat. The helium is topped up on an annual basis, using only a minimal amount, and it is completely replaced about once every 10 years.
Airships cruise at 20,000 feet, so they’re unobtrusive, and they’re much more stable and quieter than airplanes (approximately 60 decibels, the same level as normal conversation).
The good news is that new technologies make the current generation of airships more energy-efficient, and they have lower emissions than airplanes and trains. Airships cost more than commercial regional jets (such as the Bombardier CRJ900), but their operating costs are much lower.
They also require less infrastructure and upkeep than passenger trains. Airships can land on water, offering passengers the convenience of being dropped off at downtown Manhattan, for example, rather than at an airfield.
Airships could lighten and speed up traffic in Lehigh County by providing an additional form of public transportation and a new cargo shipping alternative. They could reduce the number of cars and 18-wheelers on our busy highways, moving people and freight more efficiently and with a lower carbon footprint.
Shipping cargo via airships would not only ease congestion for residents, but it would create new business opportunities and help companies with large distribution centers in our county operate more efficiently — a win-winwin for those businesses, local entrepreneurs and our communities.