Traffic could be a thing of the past if this new concept design from Airbus ever comes to fruition.
The Pop.Up is the aircraft company’s epic idea for a hybrid driving and flying machine that would serve commuters in a transportation network. Its detachable capsule connects to either a four-wheeled driving base or a set of high-tech wings, depending on road conditions.
Simply plug your destination into the capsule’s app, wait for it to arrive, and let it drive or fly you from Point A to B.
By Suzy Strutner – Full Story at The Huffington Post
Sorry Scott but this is about as practical as a rubber crutch except for the ultra wealthy possibly. A vehicle that has to lift itself is never going to be as efficient as a vehicle with wheels until we have very low energy consumption anti gravity. So just from a global warming standpoint not practical until we have carbon neutral energy in very compact and cheap form and the mentioned anti gravity..
Such a flying car system will also need a very sophisticated automatic guidance system. Look how many we kill world wide per year with manual control cars. How many with a million flying vehicles in New York air space daily, multiplied world wide? Just from a take off and landing standpoint they need to be VTOL configuration and park in the same or less area than a current car.
The flying vehicle has been proposed and prototypes built virtually continuously since the 1920s and is still not a commercially available and viable item at a reasonable price. IMO just not a practical item with current population and traffic density I am afraid. Sorry but I am a pessimist on the likelihood of this one.