FBN: Flying cars? Porsche executive hints at taxis in the sky.
Where Porsche’s going, you don’t need roads.
The German sports car maker could build a flying car for a potential ride-sharing service, a Porsche executive told German magazine Automobilwoche.
“That would really make sense. If I drive from (the Porsche plant in) Zuffenhausen to Stuttgart airport, I need at least half an hour, if I’m lucky. Flying would take only three and a half minutes,” Porsche sales chief Detlev von Platen said, according to Reuters .
Porsche, a subsidiary of Volkswagen, isn’t the only automaker working on designs for flying cars. Volkswagen car designer Italdesign and aircraft giant Airbus unveiled the Pop.Up, a two-seater flying car concept, at the 2017 Geneva Motor Show. Volocopter, which is backed by Mercedes-Benz owner Daimler, and U.S.-based Terrafugia are among the startups developing flying vehicles. MORE
What could possibly go wrong?
Oh great, texting and flying.
Just what we need flying assholes.
Maybe they should perfect the Flying Monkeys (out of their butts) first.
Bruce Willis approves (5th Element)
Flying cars in the 50-60s (when they promised them) would have been fine. Today? Not with the government control of everything. For every positive, there would be 8 rules, taxes, mandates, kick backs, and anti-fun regulations to wade through.
I guess they figure they might as well get some of that mad taxpayer money like elon musk.
“Where were going we dont need……..roads.”
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
So, do I need to file a flight plan every time I need to run an errand? I would say “Good, more room on the road for drivers”. Problem is, not only do I have to watch out for careless drivers on the road, now I’ll have to watch for idiots dropping out of the sky.
It looks to me like all the efforts to build combination automobile-airplanes were on the wrong track. Those folding wings just won’t cut it. What we’ll end up with will be multi-rotor vehicles in the current hobby drone pattern. My guess is that the power train will consist of electric prop motors getting their juice from a fossil fuel burning turbine generator. And they won’t be suitable for surface travel, only airborne.
@Claudia, I’m afraid you’re right. Govt will demand control and they’ll screw it up as always.
My Porsche already flies. But, don’t tell the cops 🙂
I could see this working if the occupants were strictly passengers. Problem is our air traffic control infrastructure. It’s about 30 years behind the times. But it is changing, slowly.
Flight plan will be filed by the vehicle when you tell it where you want to go.
There are a LOT of manufacturers working on this. Uber is just one of the deep money pockets supplying financing.
This is finally going to happen, just not quite like we thought in the 50’s and 60’s.