Even as the world wraps its brains around the concept of autonomous cars, ride sharing company Uber is pushing for short trip air mobility services to start as early as 2023. It is bringing together a set of companies as part of its Uber Elevate programme, which aims to decongest the world’s top cities by offering quick and affordable aerial transportation options. Here is everything you want to know about Uber Elevate and Uber Air
What is Uber Elevate?
Launched in October 2016, Uber Elevate has developed into a partnership of experienced aircraft manufacturers, real estate and technology companies and even government agencies like NASA to create aircraft, infrastructure and SOPs for urban air mobility. The plan is to fly eVTOL (electric vertical take off and landing) aircraft on short distances of around 100 km, at speeds between 150-200 mph and cruising altitude of 1000-2000 feet on a single charge.
Uber has already announced that test flights of Uber Air will take place in Dallas-Fort Worth/Frisco Texas and Los Angeles in 2020 with commercial flights starting 2023. Last week, it announced that one city from among India, Japan, Australia, France and Brazil will be picked as the third, international, destination for Uber Air flights.
How will air mobility help cut congestion?
Uber wants to de-hyphenate transportation from surface transport which have always been path-based. Air mobility is node-based and each node can be connected to any of the other nodes. Uber cites the examples of India, where CST to Mumbai airport or a Gurgaon to Connaught Place commute would be reduced to just 10 minutes, thus saving the users at least two hours every day. Uber’s estimate is that urban congestion costs India alone $22 billion a year.
Uber COO Barney Harford told indianexpress.com: “Uber Air will be safe, reliable and, over time, cost effective. We believe that the model we are developing will make it accessible for many with price points that line up with the cost of getting an Uber X,” he says, but that will also depend on when the concept is able to “evolve from a piloted version to an autonomous one”.