6 ms·

I hope they fly themselves as well. Humans can barely manage to safely pilot a car in 2 dimensions. I don't want to think of the carnage that would result if we

by imgabe 10y ago

I hope they fly themselves as well. Humans can barely manage to safely pilot a car in 2 dimensions. I don't want to think of the carnage that would result if we took existing traffic and moved it 10,000 feet up in the air. Every fender bender would become a multiple fatality.

tachyonbeam 10y ago
I think everyone working on this is well-aware of this problem. It's obvious that there can't be widespread adoption without self-piloting technology. The danger to passengers and people on the ground is much too great, and the burden of getting a pilot license is also too much of an obstacle for most people. There are other considerations such as requirements for frequent routine inspections on flying vehicles, which many people couldn't be trusted to fulfill, which also suggest that a self-driving-uber kind of model is really the right solution. Shameless plug: my blog post from last year on this topic: https://pointersgonewild.com/2015/09/15/all-hope-is-not-lost-for-flying-cars/ https://pointersgonewild.com/2015/09/15/all-hope-is-not-lost...
detritus 10y ago
Surely it would be simpler than dealing with the complexity current '2d' autonomous car systems face? As long as you have designated drop zones, everything else becomes mathematically simpler.
- antiquark 10y ago
  But their entire path would require a drop zone. So in effect, there would be these long strips on the ground mirroring the flight paths of these flying cars. You might even run out of space on the ground for drop zones.
  - jonshariat 10y ago
    With the type of aircraft in the article, they could come down like helicopters do, right?
    - antiquark 10y ago
      I figured that the drop zone would be used if the vehicle encountered some failure, and had to land immediately (or crash land even), which would prevent it from continuing flight to a smaller drop zone that's some distance away.
  - bobsil1 10y ago
    Just follow freeways. Though that gives up point to point efficiency.
  - wongarsu 10y ago
    Just designate all (currently free) parking spaces as drop zones, and all roads as emergency drop zones. Since ground-based cars will in all probability continue to be a thing, roads are not guaranteed to be empty, but are guaranteed to be plentiful and nearly everywhere. Autonomous cars can be signaled as some road strip is reserved for emergency landing, and within seconds they can vacate the road strip and block it from conventional vehicles (assuming a sufficient portion of ground vehicles becomes autonomous).
    - mannykannot 10y ago
      Roads are guaranteed not to be empty enough for this purpose in any urban area - road traffic might diminish somewhat, but not go away, with the arrival of flying cars. Even if a flying car could fold up to be the size of a current car while parked (which is not at all an easy matter) it will not be that small in a landing configuration.
nrjdhsbsid 10y ago
Automatic flight is much easier than autonomous driving. Not much to run into up there :).
- afterburner 10y ago
  Until everyone has a flying car?
- wongarsu 10y ago
  >Not much to run into up there :) So far. In a future where people commute in flying cars while delivery drones descend from some flying warehouse I'm not so sure this stays true. The saving grace is probably that up there we don't have to accommodate legacy vehicles. We can just force all airborne vehicles to talk to each other with some universal collision avoidance/traffic routing protocol.
  - willglynn 10y ago
    > We can just force all airborne vehicles to talk to each other with some universal collision avoidance/traffic routing protocol. It's not exactly what you described, but in the US, the FAA already has a requirement for aircraft to broadcast their position and velocity in all but the least congested airspace by 2020 [1]. This has been in the works for over a decade [2], and among other things, the information provided by this system can be used to augment existing collision avoidance schemes [3]. [1] https://www.faa.gov/nextgen/programs/adsb/faq/#o2 https://www.faa.gov/nextgen/programs/adsb/faq/#o2 [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_dependent_surveillance_–_broadcast#US_implementation_timetable https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_dependent_surveillan... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_collision_avoidance_system#Relationship_to_automatic_dependent_surveillance-broadcast_.28ADS-B.29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_collision_avoidance_sy...
- civilian 10y ago
  Are you familiar with Smeed's Law? I think that it will also apply to flying cars. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smeed's_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smeed's_law
paulddraper 10y ago
> if we took existing traffic and moved it 10,000 feet up in the air Wouldn't you move it 1,000 feet up, 2,000 feet up, 3,000 feet up... There's a lot more space in the air than on land. Plus, in 3D you can make two non-intersecting non-parallel straight paths. Can't do that in 2D.
- smallnamespace 10y ago
  > There's a lot more space in the air than on land. But that's mitigated by the fact that the failure modes and much, much worse. I can drive safely at highway speeds with a couple hundred feet of separation between cars. FAA rules on safe separation between planes laterally is about 3 miles, or about 50 times the distance, or 2500 times the surface area. Plus planes compete with one another for access to airports, so you haven't actually solved any congestion issues -- the bottleneck is still near the ground.
  - paulddraper 10y ago
    A 3 mile horizontal radius has little to do with flying and a lot to do with speed. At ordinary commercial airline speeds, it's the equivalent of a "20-second rule" (i.e. it's the distance covered in 20 seconds by a 500-600mph vehicle).
    - cmurf 10y ago
      There is a 250KIAS speed limit below 10000'MSL that applies to everyone flying VFR including airlines. They're quickly climbing out above that and end up being a non-factor. The real issue is all the other general aviation aircraft.
    - Dove 10y ago
      Just the same, cars can be driven almost bumper to bumper, at arbitrarily low speeds, in ten foot wide lanes. The realities of wind and minimum forward speed and prop wash dictate that aircraft will need a lot more clearance than a car does. I'm sure it will depend on the particular air vehicle and the rules of traffic in the sky, but I for one would have to be convinced that aircraft can give better throughput than a road can. On the face of things, I'm not sure that's the case.
flamedoge 10y ago
It's ok, autonomous flying cars will save the day

by imgabe 10y ago

tachyonbeam 10y ago

I think everyone working on this is well-aware of this problem. It's obvious that there can't be widespread adoption without self-piloting technology. The danger to passengers and people on the ground is much too great, and the burden of getting a pilot license is also too much of an obstacle for most people. There are other considerations such as requirements for frequent routine inspections on flying vehicles, which many people couldn't be trusted to fulfill, which also suggest that a self-driving-uber kind of model is really the right solution. Shameless plug: my blog post from last year on this topic: https://pointersgonewild.com/2015/09/15/all-hope-is-not-lost-for-flying-cars/ https://pointersgonewild.com/2015/09/15/all-hope-is-not-lost...

detritus 10y ago

Surely it would be simpler than dealing with the complexity current '2d' autonomous car systems face? As long as you have designated drop zones, everything else becomes mathematically simpler.

antiquark 10y ago
But their entire path would require a drop zone. So in effect, there would be these long strips on the ground mirroring the flight paths of these flying cars. You might even run out of space on the ground for drop zones.
- jonshariat 10y ago
  With the type of aircraft in the article, they could come down like helicopters do, right?
  - antiquark 10y ago
    I figured that the drop zone would be used if the vehicle encountered some failure, and had to land immediately (or crash land even), which would prevent it from continuing flight to a smaller drop zone that's some distance away.
- bobsil1 10y ago
  Just follow freeways. Though that gives up point to point efficiency.
- wongarsu 10y ago
  Just designate all (currently free) parking spaces as drop zones, and all roads as emergency drop zones. Since ground-based cars will in all probability continue to be a thing, roads are not guaranteed to be empty, but are guaranteed to be plentiful and nearly everywhere. Autonomous cars can be signaled as some road strip is reserved for emergency landing, and within seconds they can vacate the road strip and block it from conventional vehicles (assuming a sufficient portion of ground vehicles becomes autonomous).
  - mannykannot 10y ago
    Roads are guaranteed not to be empty enough for this purpose in any urban area - road traffic might diminish somewhat, but not go away, with the arrival of flying cars. Even if a flying car could fold up to be the size of a current car while parked (which is not at all an easy matter) it will not be that small in a landing configuration.

nrjdhsbsid 10y ago

Automatic flight is much easier than autonomous driving. Not much to run into up there :).

afterburner 10y ago
Until everyone has a flying car?
wongarsu 10y ago
>Not much to run into up there :) So far. In a future where people commute in flying cars while delivery drones descend from some flying warehouse I'm not so sure this stays true. The saving grace is probably that up there we don't have to accommodate legacy vehicles. We can just force all airborne vehicles to talk to each other with some universal collision avoidance/traffic routing protocol.
- willglynn 10y ago
  > We can just force all airborne vehicles to talk to each other with some universal collision avoidance/traffic routing protocol. It's not exactly what you described, but in the US, the FAA already has a requirement for aircraft to broadcast their position and velocity in all but the least congested airspace by 2020 [1]. This has been in the works for over a decade [2], and among other things, the information provided by this system can be used to augment existing collision avoidance schemes [3]. [1] https://www.faa.gov/nextgen/programs/adsb/faq/#o2 https://www.faa.gov/nextgen/programs/adsb/faq/#o2 [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_dependent_surveillance_–_broadcast#US_implementation_timetable https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_dependent_surveillan... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_collision_avoidance_system#Relationship_to_automatic_dependent_surveillance-broadcast_.28ADS-B.29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_collision_avoidance_sy...
civilian 10y ago
Are you familiar with Smeed's Law? I think that it will also apply to flying cars. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smeed's_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smeed's_law

paulddraper 10y ago

> if we took existing traffic and moved it 10,000 feet up in the air Wouldn't you move it 1,000 feet up, 2,000 feet up, 3,000 feet up... There's a lot more space in the air than on land. Plus, in 3D you can make two non-intersecting non-parallel straight paths. Can't do that in 2D.

smallnamespace 10y ago
> There's a lot more space in the air than on land. But that's mitigated by the fact that the failure modes and much, much worse. I can drive safely at highway speeds with a couple hundred feet of separation between cars. FAA rules on safe separation between planes laterally is about 3 miles, or about 50 times the distance, or 2500 times the surface area. Plus planes compete with one another for access to airports, so you haven't actually solved any congestion issues -- the bottleneck is still near the ground.
- paulddraper 10y ago
  A 3 mile horizontal radius has little to do with flying and a lot to do with speed. At ordinary commercial airline speeds, it's the equivalent of a "20-second rule" (i.e. it's the distance covered in 20 seconds by a 500-600mph vehicle).
  - cmurf 10y ago
    There is a 250KIAS speed limit below 10000'MSL that applies to everyone flying VFR including airlines. They're quickly climbing out above that and end up being a non-factor. The real issue is all the other general aviation aircraft.
  - Dove 10y ago
    Just the same, cars can be driven almost bumper to bumper, at arbitrarily low speeds, in ten foot wide lanes. The realities of wind and minimum forward speed and prop wash dictate that aircraft will need a lot more clearance than a car does. I'm sure it will depend on the particular air vehicle and the rules of traffic in the sky, but I for one would have to be convinced that aircraft can give better throughput than a road can. On the face of things, I'm not sure that's the case.

flamedoge 10y ago

It's ok, autonomous flying cars will save the day