Things we thought of as science fiction or still far off in the future, we can now see in real life. Who would have imagined a person flying alongside of jet planes like Tony Start (Iron Man) or racing across town on a hoverpod like Luke Skywalker in (Star Wars- Return of the Jedi).
Hoverbikes
At the hoverbike level there are already a couple of designs out in the advanced stages of production. One is the Aero-X by Aerofex and the other is HoverBike by Chris Malloy. The Aero-X is expected to go into production by 2017.
Both models have ducted fans for their propulsion and hovering systems but they differ in the number of fans they use. The Aero-X has two fans where as the hoverbike has four fans but in an overlapping formation. The hoverbikes are two seaters and aim to compete with two wheeled road motorbikes or scooters. They most closely resemble motorbikes but will most likely have a flying ceiling of 3-5 meters and a cruising speed of 50-70 Km/h.
Further Reading:
- Aero-X hoverbike set to take off in 2017
- Get around STAR WARS-style: Hoverbike lets you fly at speeds of 45mph - and it could launch as early as 2017
- Hoverbike is a revolution in aviation, designed to do what a helicopter does, but cost less and do so better
- The future is here: Personal heli-motorcycles near testing phase
PPlanes (STOLs) & VTOLs
The difference between PPlanes and VTOLs is in the way they take off and land. VTOLs take off and land vertically like a helicopter but with the important difference that their lift and propulsion systems are located either within the aircraft's body or by being ducted, making them safe to any people around them. Their lift systems have had their downward airflow significantly mitigated.
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| Image: Moller SkyCar M400 Creative Commons 3.0 Jeff McNeill |
- The Moller SkyCar and the Verticopter which are American designs.
- The X-Hawk and AirMule both developed by Israeli developer Urbanaero and its subsidiary companies Tactical Robotics Ltd. and Metro Skyways Ltd.
- The YouFly developed by Australian Entecho.
The technology for some of these vehicles is easily scalable allowing them to be developed for greater carrying capabilities. Their design and work orientation allows them to function in a variety of forms ranging from personal air vehicle to search and rescue, fire fighting or general assistance vehicles. There work orientation allows them to have a flight ceiling of a few hundred meters, which is considerably higher than the hoverbike range.
PPlanes unlike VTOLs and as their name suggests are Short Take Off and Landing vehicles (STOLs) and therefore require certain facilities or area specifications for take off and landing.
Two models that are already in production are the American Terrafugia TF-X and the Slovakian AeroMobil 3.0. Althought these are not the only PPlanes in production they are particularly interesting because they are roadable planes (flying cars) rather than helicopter variants. Rotating blade STOLs such as the PAL-V ONE share some features and functions with PPlanes but they require more specialized take off and landing spaces.
Commercial passenger or cargo planes
Personal air vehicles will supplement rather than replace commercial passenger planes and jets.
With more and more people travelling by air all the time and with environmental regulations becoming stricter, passenger airplanes are being forced to make major changes. Peoples' need to travel faster from point-A to point-B means that some planes will have to travel faster, and by faster what is envisioned is supersonic. The public also want planes to greatly reduce their carbon footprint, to be quieter overhead and to provide very comfortable experience without increasing costs. The airplanes of the future will have to change in order to meet all these demands. 1.7 Million respondents to an Airbus survey in 2012 highlight passenger priorities in shaping the future of air travel.
"Passengers really care about the environment, 96% of them told us we want more green flying, more sustainable growth. Only a few percent are interested in speed and even then it is more about the whole travel experience. The element they like the least is really the delays. Delays at the check-in, delays for passport control, delays
in flight when you have to circle around before you can land, delays on ground, and delays to get the luggage, delays for the ground transportation and this is what we are going to focus on in the coming years." (Airbus Representative in Olsen 2012)
Once mass private transportation leaves the ground and gets into the air things will quickly become very complex. Where as now transportation is limited to the two dimensions of space x,y on the ground, the only way to alleviate congestion on the roads is to use a version of the 3rd dimension "z" by going underground with underpasses or overground with bridges. That solution isn't that practical because there is a limit to the amount of underpasses or bridges that can be constructed and still be useful. Using the 3rd dimension of air above ground becomes more appealing as it opens up a much greater area to move in. Vehicles of different types will be able to travel in parallel levels vertically one above the other.
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Wheeled vehicles would be on the ground, hoverbikes would travel in the air above them. Personal PPlanes would fly above the hoverbikes and probably in the mid Troposphere. Finally the big passenger or cargo planes would fly above all in their own allocated space.
Infrastructure and Regulation
“gridlocked highways increasingly burden our society. Currently the doorstep to doorstep average speed for cars in the United States is 35mph and decreasing year by year. Statistics show that , on average, cars carry only 1.3 people even with high occupancy vehicle (HOV) in place. The situation in Europe is not better” (CORDIS 2013)The leading and driving factors which will allow both the ecological (fuel) and economic (financing) development of these new air vehicles is advancement in production technology which is now leading towards evolution and radical innovation... speed, lighter materials and low noise are major considerations.
In 2013, CORDIS, which is coordinated by French (ONERA), administratively and supported by Israeli (Integram Communications) and 11 other EU organizations (including the University of Pattras Greece) drawn from research and academia, published a final report and summary on their Personal Air Transport Systems (PATS). The CORDIS proposition outlines a variety of Concepts of Operations (Con Ops) in the following way " A high level formal description of how system elements operate and interact in order to safely carry people and luggage from an origin point to a destination point". The ambitious aim is eventually to achieve this with no on-board human piloting skills.
“- roadable vehicles that carry you from door to door (ground and flight phases combined;These Con Ops suggestions envisage multiple types and altitude specific aircraft, supporting the multiple aerial level usage referred to above.
- non-roadable vehicles that fly urban paths and are being operated wherever the vehicles are, from city centre to city centre (thus most likely suitable for VTOL or STOL air vehicles);
- non-roadable vehicles that fly urban paths but being operated from PPLANE ports (Pports) in city centres“ thus most likely suitable for VTOL or STOL air vehicles;
- flying from small PPorts on the outskirts of towns, as a complementary transportation means (not a direct door to door solution).” (CORDIS 2013)
As the shape and technologies of the airplanes change so to will the shape and design of airports they take off and land from. Air travel as we know it today will soon be a memory if even some of these current trends prove true. Neither aircraft or airports of the future are predicted to look like those we are currently familiar with.
