Japan would allow air car to traffic from 2023

  • Reading Time:4Minutes

The Japanese government believes the cars have just had enough of a hundred years in the spotlight, and it’s time for another traffic revolution. The market for flying cars, or officially eVTOLs (electric aircraft capable of vertical take-off and landing), could cross the $ 1 trillion mark in the next decade, with Japan taking its share of the industry’s upswing.

According to the Japan Times, the government wants to reduce air traffic congestion in large cities by diverting traffic to air, and to make it easy to reach mountainous areas and more remote islands – not to mention how well they can be used in emergencies and disasters. a fast-moving aircraft could come.

According to the forecast, flying cars will be niche products for the first time, only the most affluent will be able to afford them, and they too will only complement the existing fleet, similar to how the helicopter market works today. Later, as they become more cost and time efficient, they can take the place of airplanes and then cars pretty slowly. Tokyo’s startup, SkyDrive leader Fukuzava Tomohiro, says by 2050, all residents of the Japanese capital will have the opportunity to get anywhere in the city’s 23 districts in ten minutes.

There are at least a hundred projects around the world in various phases working to implement flying cars, including well-known companies like Airbus, Boeing or Uber. The designs are quite diverse: while the German Lilium, for example, is developing a five-seater, wide-wing monster, SkyDrive’s two-seater propeller vehicle most closely resembles a human-sized drone and only takes the place of two traditional cars in the parking lot – not least the world’s smallest aircraft. your car.

The 1.5-meter-tall, 4 x 3.5-meter-wide SD-XX is scheduled to go commercial in 2023 and will be able to fly tens of kilometers at 100 km / h on a single charge. The country’s first human aircraft test was conducted in April this year with a battery-powered vehicle equipped with two propellers at four corners.

SkyDrive started as a side project of Toyota employees in 2014, with a budget of only 40 million yen (about 90 million forints), spun off from the parent company in 2017, and by the fall of 2019 attracted a total investment of 2 billion yen (nearly 5.5 billion forints). NEC and Panasonic, among others, boarded. Toyota announced in January 2020 that it would invest an even larger amount of $ 400 million (approximately HUF 120 billion) in a company called Joby Aviation, which is developing an air taxi capable of carrying four passengers.

According to Fukuzava, it is not until the end of 2020 that an eVTOL can be developed that can travel at speeds of up to 60 km / h on the roads, but the big advantage of the vehicles is that, unlike helicopters with very few landing sites, due to their light weight and quietness, they will be comfortable to find a parking space: they can fit either in the yard or on the roof of a flat-roofed building.

There are now three target dates for SkyDrive staff: they plan to hold the first public human aircraft test at the end of this summer, try to launch their air taxi service in Tokyo and Osaka in 2023, and launch a fully self-propelled aircraft in 2028.

It is not yet known how much air taxis will cost passengers, but Fukuzava said it will be significantly cheaper than helicopters, where they will also ask for 50-80 thousand yen for a trip. The price of the SD-XX, which can be purchased, will rival that of a more expensive car, and the company wants to sell a hundred of them in the first year.

Recent article

EVTOL & VTOL News & Articles

The flying ambulance arrives at lightning speed

EVTOL & VTOL News & Articles

The electric car revolution could continue in the air

EVTOL & VTOL News & Articles

Unmanned aerial taxis flew in a unique formation

Electric airplane News & Articles

NASA’s Innovations: Soaring into an Electrified Flight Future

EVTOL & VTOL News & Articles

Could eVTOLs and Air Taxis Replace Public Transport ?

Additional aircraft News & Articles

The Morphobot: An Innovation in Multimodal Robotics

News & Articles Points of interest

The Dawn of AI Air Travel: Airbus and its Vision for Autonomy

Air taxi News & Articles

Volocopter’s High-Flying Ambitions for the Olympics

News & Articles Propulsion-Fuel

The Horizon of Aviation: Airbus’ Vision for 2035 and Beyond

EVTOL & VTOL News & Articles

A Shift in Aviation Licensing and Training

Drones News & Articles

Russia’s Path to Drone Supremacy

Air taxi News & Articles

Israel’s Pioneering Venture into Drone Transport

Air taxi News & Articles

More efficient air taxis in the future

Air taxi News & Articles

Testing of perhaps the most promising air taxi begins

Additional aircraft News & Articles

Navigating the Future: Autonomous Helicopters Soar High

EVTOL & VTOL News & Articles

Embracing the Future: Seoul’s Leap into Urban Air Mobility
More articles you may be interested in...

Air taxi News & Articles

The Coming Electric Air Taxi Revolution: Competing with Train Tickets ?

The Dutch company, Electron Aviation, is making a bold promise that is set to disrupt.......... READ MORE

News & Articles Propulsion-Fuel

Unveiling the Whisper of Innovation: CycloTech’s Exploration into CycloRotor Noise Levels

In the fast-paced realm of aeronautical engineering, the introduction of CycloRotors has heralded a paradigm.......... READ MORE

Points of interest

Sailing the Skies in Style: Airbus’s Novel Vision for Air Travel

Navigating the dawn of a fresh chapter in aviation, Airbus recently shared its audacious plans.......... READ MORE

Drones News & Articles

Boosting Agriculture: A Drone Revolution Awaits in Budapest

The stage is set in Hungary, as it stands on the brink of an exciting.......... READ MORE

News & Articles Propulsion-Fuel

Embracing the Future with Rolls-Royce’s Revolutionary UltraFan Engine

Just when you thought the apex of innovation had been reached, Rolls-Royce challenges the notion.......... READ MORE

Air taxi News & Articles

Testing of perhaps the most promising air taxi begins

For some of us, the very idea of an air taxi evokes scenes straight out.......... READ MORE

Additional aircraft News & Articles

Navigating the Future: Autonomous Helicopters Soar High

Unmanned helicopters are no longer a concept in some futuristic Sci-Fi novel. They're here, revolutionizing.......... READ MORE

EVTOL & VTOL News & Articles

Embracing the Future: Seoul’s Leap into Urban Air Mobility

In an audacious move to revolutionize its transport system, Seoul - the bustling South Korean.......... READ MORE