Main Street Rides

Every twenty-year-old has suspected that they would be driving a flying car by the time they were 65 for decades.  So far, the twenty somethings of the 1960’s and 1970’s have been awarded with hybrids, EVs, and insanely fast super cars, but no flying cars.  No one can complain about the leaps and bounds that the automotive industry has progressed over the years.  Yet, with all the technology we have today, isn’t a flying car feasible?  The answer is yes.

Flying cars aren’t not just a futuristic fantasy anymore.  Thanks to two companies that are in a bit of a race to produce the first production flying car, flying across the state to the in-laws for Thanksgiving and driving to the grocery store in the same vehicle is quite possible.  Terrafugia, an American company has developed a prototype, fixed wing airplane.  They call it the “Transition Street-legal Airplane” and transitions it does.  With the wings locked in the flight position, it looks like your run of the mill kit airplane, with the exception of headlights, taillights, and a steering wheel.  When you’re done flying the wings fold in half and tuck themselves along the side of the vehicle.  It’s gangly looking, it’s long, but it’ll drive around town just fine and runs off of 91 octane gasoline that can be pumped at any gas station.

The Transition has a competitor from the Netherlands that takes a much different approach.  While the Transition seats two, drives like a limousine, and flies with fixed wings, the Dutch Personal Air and Land vehicle (PAL-V) drives like a sports car on three wheels, seats just one, and flies like a helicopter.  Both vehicles have documented successful tests of driving and flying.  Both drive, both fly, but both take very different approaches.  The Transition needs a traditional run way to take flight while the PAL-V can take off from a tradition road.

I may be following a faulty trend but I think there my quite a few people flying and driving the same vehicle by the time I’m 65.  With both prototypes proving that they can successfully fly and drive, I would imagine that both companies with be working with investors to take things to the next level.  The very wealthy may be flying to grandmothers house and pulling up to the drive in the same vehicle within a couple of years.

[Source: NPR]