The modernization effort for air traffic control should include the creation of a “new public-private cooperative model to manage low-altitude airspace” because the volume and tempo of new Advanced Air Mobility traffic will quickly overwhelm the existing system, according to a national strategy released by the Department of Transportation on Wednesday. The lengthy document says the existing system will only accommodate the first low-altitude stages of AAM integration. It says the current push to bring ATC up to date is a golden opportunity to carve out room for eVTOLs, STOL, and other new forms of air transport. “We will take advantage of full-scale air traffic modernization … to establish efficient, low-altitude traffic management for AAM and unmanned aircraft, such as drones that are already deployed,” says the report, which was written by the Advanced Air Mobility Interagency Working Group.
Even though the contract for the first stage of ATC modernization has just been awarded to defense contractor Peraton, the group sets ambitious goals for the new aviation regime over the next 10 years that sees “new air operations in multiple urban and rural areas, including quiet flights with Powered Lift aircraft and short-takeoff-and-landing flights that will increase travel options and reduce noise impacts.” These aircraft will be operating as airport shuttles or medevacs and augment or even replace surface transportation in places like Seattle where ferries and bridges knit the transportation system together. “By 2035, there will be advanced air operations with exciting use cases, including fully autonomous flight in geographies with insufficient labor or harsh conditions that might otherwise limit flights from operating—advancing possibilities,” the document says.
The document goes into significant detail about how all this should come about, but it involves a wholesale reconstruction of every facet of aviation over the next 10 years, including parts of that system that haven’t even been started yet, like the network of vertiports that will serve many of the aircraft, automated communications systems, and even a new weather monitoring and forecast system. It also envisions creation of a new security system to screen and vet passengers who will be taking all these short-duration flights. The document also addresses the impact of dozens of aircraft flying at low level through neighborhoods and commercial areas along with the vertiports and other infrastructure that will be required. There’s also a section on the creation of a new skilled workforce to handle the myriad jobs that will be created by a fully fledged Advanced Air Mobility system. The full report is copied below.
Groups at the forefront of AAM seem happy with the strategy. “The strategy is an important signal from the U.S. federal government,” says François Lassale, president and CEO of Vertical Aviation International. “It makes clear that the next generation of powered-lift aircraft are not a concept. They are a developing operational reality that requires deliberate and thoughtful integration into the existing aviation system as FAA certification and standards advance.” National Air Transportation Association CEO Curt Castagna said the strategy is an important milestone in increasing the reach of aviation. “AAM has the potential to serve as a catalyst for new aviation services and connections, extending aviation’s reach to more communities.”
Double dose of Pixie Dust.
And dream on. The folks that wrote this will be long gone in ten years. An opinion of reality.
I get the distinct impression that the filks who wrote this are nearly completely ignorant of light GA and VFR flying. Their brave new world of privatized low altitude ATC sounds horrifying…. unless they aren’t ignorant, and shutting down traffic that isn’t under positive control is the point.
I am as skeptical as the above posters on this plan and the air mobility enterprise in general. Unlike investors willing to throw huge amounts of money in its development, I haven’t been convinced that the concept is economically viable. Consider the public reaction to frequent helicopter activity in urban ares. Regardless if the risk and noise is well managed, public perception rarely involves logic or reason. General acceptance is doubtful.
What was it? $1.2 billion burned up on LiliumJet which when you got down to it was the equivalent of a helicopter with a rotor the diameter of a GA piston prop. These “investors” just aren’t that smart. They were told.
There is a fixed wing motorglider derived production trainer that will fly 45 minute missions but you’ll be buying lots of new batteries often. Add vertical flight capability and you are dreaming for anything useful.
Now a two seat private use (not commercial air taxi) small aircraft with distributed electrically driven rotors for VTOL and a small piston engine for cruise flight would be an interesting project. Best as a kitplane, at least at first.