CASA says air taxis within 5 years
 

From the ABC NEWS

Never get off the ground.
CASA will put so many regulatory hurdles in place it will uneconomic except for the UBER rich. In which case they will just take a chopper.

Mick

But Mick, you have it all wrong, surely?
Mr Gibson said Uber was not the only company looking to Australia because of its easier regulatory environment.
Google's parent company, Alphabet, was preparing to trial drones that made home deliveries in Canberra ahead of trials in the US, partly because he Australian system was more flexible.

Does he actually believe his own BS? Easier regulatory environment than USA? Get off the christmas sauce man.

Just as well they're big companies investing billions of dollars because god knows small business can't afford CASA's regulatory structures.

There might be a few barriers, but those that ARE there are f***ing monsters. Never happen. The Labor electorates killed any real helicopters from landing within a bull's roar of anywhere. Electric choppers won't fare any better.

Poor Mr Gobsome, havent seen much of him in late 2018 but he seems keen to be a TV media tart over the Xmas period spruiking on a couple of issues.
One thing you can be sure of from the 'Corporate Spinmeister' some of it is 'fake news' ie BS.

Honestly, I think CASA are wasting their time and should instead be drafting legislation for the new up and coming teleporter machine.

Who can remember all that gyrocopter spin about city/airport taxis back in the 90's? I still have a brochure about it and marvel at the clever marketing used.

If there was any real merit to these fickle "air-taxi" contraptions then the military would already have a sizeable share of it but they don't, instead it's just these multi-billion dollar corporations getting sucked into believing their own B.S. vortex and taking gullible executives and media with them for the ride. The end result being a lot of foolish people part with their money as that 90's fairytale repeats itself over and over again.

You guys may have this all wrong, Whether their proposals work remains to be seen, if someone with enough clout comes in and bashes CASA over the head a few times maybe something might just change.

As someone has said above, it’s simply about cost and regulation. The technology is there and assuming it’s reliable and priced appropriately, it will surely take off, pardon the pun.

Melbourne CBD for example to a pad at Tulla, absolutely, why not, every 10 minutes or whatever?

There was a mob trying it a while back with a couple of flash Bell’s but from memory it was a little pricey and didn’t go right to the airport.

Folks,
There is a precedent, those of you who have been around long enough, think back to the ANOs ---- there was a reserve section for pilot licensing for ornithopters. Flapping wing aeroplane, for those of you not up with the latest technology.
As for CASA and Gibson, it is the Silly Season, after all!!
Tootle pip!!

Anybody got Mr. Gibson's contact details?
I've got a bridge in Sydney he might be interested in.

Hang on George;:= I have an Opera House for sale that I'm sure he'd consider first!!:hmm:

Funny thing, I had someone from CAANZ telling me this sort of thing was going to happen in the near future. There are a couple of companies already trialling these machines in New Zealand. I told him it wouldn't be in either of our life times.

I don't see these machines being much cheaper if any to buy and operate than a helicopter of similar load carrying capacity. If there was a business case for this there'd be a number of businesses already doing something very similar using helicopters. There isn't, so I don't see these Air Taxis as the next big thing.

Further I don't see the general population being all that enthusiastic about all these thing whizzing around overhead, they won't exactly be quiet.

I think it's instructional to compare the popularity of conventional model helicopters - available but experience to operate, difficult to maintain and requiring lots of skill and practice to pilot - with the current quadcopter craze to illustrate why conventional helicopters as air taxis are not a great business analog. That is leaving aside the required 100kg meat-based flight controller that diminishes payload capacity.

They will try to do what they did with share-riding.
Come in and start flying, stuff the Regs, get the Millennial crowd on board and cry "anti-startup" on social media when they get grounded

The Future is here!,,,,, Soon,,, Maybe! Or later!
 

Flying cars, all the rage in the 50s,
Anyway
A direct link to the airport in a modern way, SAS did a 89 pax Hovercraft from from Malmø to Købenahavn CPH airport.
All the rage from 1984 to 1994!
Then replaced by Norwegian speedboats made on my island ( Oma Baatbyggeri As).
Then a wopping big bridge/ tunnel that we all can admire when operating to CPH.
Now a train leaves Malmø several times per hr and use 20 odd minutes to CPH terminal!
Yea
That old bridge is doomed once the UberDoober Air gets going.
Standing by for multiple TAs on approach.
Or not!

Maglev train.
Shanghai has a commercial, working, proof of concept wersion. From memory, it does the 30 odd km trip in 8 minutes. It’s losing money at a furious rate just like any other air taxi would. The difference from the passenger perspective is that it’s smooth, quiet and you can bring all your luggage.

try to find a building rooftop in Oz that has the following properties:

1. Flat
2. Unobstructed by phone antennas, microwave relays, aircon unit
3. Big enough to terminate a Flying Car, and has a re-charge facility for said car
4. Has elevator access to roof
5. Has secure elevator that takes passengers only from lobby to roof
6. Has occupants of building willing to have this stuff happening on their roof, elevators, parking lot and lobby

OK, you have found 2 buildings in Melbourne that satisfy this requirement. Now find passengers who want to travel between these 2 buildings. Good luck.

Quadcopters with variable RPM/fixed-pitch rotors cannot be scaled up to the size needed to carry 4 or 6 pax. But CGI can do it, and make it look good.
People seem to think these things will be quiet - piddly little multiple rotors screaming their heads off, there might not be the turbine noise, but the blade noise will be considerable. Moving large amounts of air slowly is far more efficient than small amounts of air moving quickly.

Even Nostradamus had something to say about it in verse 4 Para 1: "and it shall come to pass amongst much wailing and gnashing of teeth that mankind is destined not to have a personal flying chariot, for the horses cannot be made that small."

Oh Oh Oh Machtuk
SUPERSONIC FLIGHT, it will be here anytime now.
Thank God for progress.
Geesss ,they make me fly Cost Index 6 .
M.75 , booooriiing!

How does cash get around the rules? Are you saying they bribe CA$A people?

How will these fancy new quadcopters that will be capable of lifting human beings plus their luggage and meet the relevant design rules and still be any cheaper than a helicopter? Radio control helicopters are pretty cheap too, comparable to the current crop of quadcopter drones.

Yep, they will do away with the on board pilot which will help with payload. There still needs to be some control system which in the short to medium term will be more expensive than an on board pilot.

No doubt someone will stump up the tremendous amounts of moolah to design and build such a system. For it to be successful it needs to be able to attract enough custom at a price that pays back the costs of development and operation. Let's assume someone does develop a usable system, it's my guess they will lose their shirts on it. Someone will pick up the left overs at a bargain basement price and not be saddled with recovering the development costs. They will still need to make enough money to pay the ongoing costs.

The disrupter models like Uber have been aimed at the masses and have challenged current pricing models, i.e. under cut the incumbents. How much do they need to undercut the incumbents in point to point air travel to make their offering affordable to the masses? In other words how much would you be prepared or be able to afford to pay for point to point air travel to get to work etc?

The other issue I see is this type of service is seen as a way to bypass gridlock on the ground. If such a service attracted enough custom to make it pay I think we would see the gridlock on the ground replaced by gridlock in the air.

I don't see the general operating noise and the downwash from the take off and landing being acceptable to allow real point to point travel for the masses. They will still need to operate from designated take off and landing areas which will cause aerial congestion at these points and the need to use these designated areas will significantly reduce the benefits of such a system. Imagine the rigmarole in getting consents for these landing/take off areas

Such a service is technologically possible but it my contention is it is logistically impractical and therefore unlikely to succeed no matter how user friendly the local aviation authorities are.

Excellent realistic post:-) There would be a multitude of considerations to make this work. Take aside the fact that the technology is there albeit in only short duration abilities at great cost there's the logistics of where are these machines going to t/off & land from? Tops of buildings? yeah right! There would be parking considerations for the users at these locations/terminals, just like public transport IE trains people still need to use their cars to get to the stations, that alone is a hassle & adds to the traffic already. The cost would be expensive for sure, remember flying? It was mostly for the wealthy then came along LCC's for the masses & now we have crowded skies at peak times, the same thing would have to happen for this idea, large numbers would need to use the service to make it viable.....I don't think so! There's nothing like this autonomous transportation ever been considered in modern day times & that's for good reasons, it's pie in the sky stuff!

"How does cash get around the rules? Are you saying they bribe CA$A people?"
Oh dear,
sorry AC, CAsA have no need for anything that crass. Simple "Donation" to the requisite
politicians re-election fund and Bob's your uncle, that's how the development sharks do it
and to some extent the airlines, think "Chairmans lounge".

One has to remember CAsA is a self serving government Corporation. Their focus will always
be "what's in it for us?". They are well versed in the timeless Bureaucratic game of thrones
manipulation of politicians in CAsA's case, using the "mystic of safety" as suits. How else over the past thirty years or so
have they got away with squandering a half billion or so of the taxpayers money on regulatory reform, all
in the name of safety, which they haven't improved by any measurable amount to produce the worlds
largest, most complex set of rules, instead of a few million and a year or so, as New Zealand did,
and copy the safest US rule set.

The political animal is always prone to policy thought bubbles, largely to attempt to outdo their opponents
thought bubbles. Some of these bubbles seem like a good idea at the time, and some are. The problem comes with
implementing them. Thats NOT the job of politicians, its the job of bureaucrats and how inept they have shown themselves
to be. Think Airport Privatisation, Pink Batts, Building the education revolution, Early learning day care for children, the NDIS etc etc.

All turned into tins of worms, not from the Pollywaffles thought bubbles but from poor implementation and management.

One issue for CASA is that the governments have already folded once before over regulations in commercial vehicle operations to Uber. My guess is that there will be enormous political pressure coming onto CASA to get this through. A repeat of what the government did to the taxi/private hire car industry could be repeated in aviation where the government regulated everyone into oblivion then turned around and said that the regulation wasn't actually necessary, hanging law abiding companies out to dry and making a complete fool of itself and its laws in the process.

What stations/ autonomous transport port. Isn't the whole idea to do away with "hubs" so you can go from point to point.
People point to the disrupters as a model for this form of transport.
But all the disrupters have done so far is develop an App and use a proven transport system - cars, bikes and now scooters. The only difference between a taxi and these disrupters is the use of an app to allow people to access private vehicles and undercut what was a tightly controlled transport model in the case of taxis.

They have not introduces a "new" transport system. Just an app that can organise a driver and a vehicle for you. Taxis have had that system in place for years. They just used an older technology (phones - remember them) but have now developed their own apps which work well.

Now with this autonomous transport system using a flying vehicle of some description, not only do they have to develop the app for organising the ride, but the mode of transport and the underlying system to support it. Landing and takeoff sites, navigation system, battery charging systems, maintenance systems, noise abatement, autonomous control or pilot control are some of the hurdles to overcome.

A previous post mentioned a sea of red lights on the highways. Just imagine a swarm of large noisy electric vehicles converging on Sydney Harbour for the New Years fireworks and then all trying to get home. Where will they park for a couple of hours?

I remember sitting on the grass outside a unit in Kirribilli watching the boat traffic after the 2000 fireworks. The boat traffic was that crowded you could have walked from Kirribilli to the Opera House across the Harbour by hopping from one boat to the next.

Just imagine cruising at 500 feet over the Sydney CBD while tweeting your latest thoughts to all your followers only to hear or see "Lost satellite reception" come up on the app that is communicating with your autonomous transport system.
The mind boggles!!

.

Uber did not introduce a whole new transport system, just an app to organise private vehicles and drivers. Same with these scooters that have resulted in a fivefold increase in admissions to the ER departments for injuries.

It's already been done... sort of.

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....6ff1099d74.jpg

I'm told the bloke at the front is a fully qualified ATPL and earning better wages that QF pilots. What he doesn't know is that he and his EBA will soon be replaced with a Raspberry Pi allowing profits to double.

Uber knowingly broke the transport rules and forced governments around the world to change rules to suit their model. They have done it once so they know they can do it again. So do observing businesses. "Ride sharing" for goodness sake, what does that mean? The whole purpose of the journey is because the passenger booked to travel, nothing is being "shared".

Although I see Uber failed in their bid in the UK to have their drivers not deemed employees, which means holiday pay, sick leave etc. Uber plan to appeal again.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/oct/30/uber-challenges-ruling-on-drivers-rights-at-court-of-appeal-london

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-12-20/uber-drivers-worker-rights-lawsuit-loss-uk-industrial-law/10637316

Calling everyone on the thread a moron seems a little ridiculous since it appears that it is you who have missed the point.

Uber to launch e-VTOL air taxis - Australian Aviation

https://www.uber.com/us/en/elevate/

https://www.cnet.com/au/news/uber-ai...-to-australia/

But the CGI movie shows them only travelling between one massive rooftop to another, in a CBD.

How will that replace my trip from quiet suburban home to the supermarket on a Sunday morning to buy breakfast?

Yeah, yeah, the ferry carries 300 people there in 35 mins, but Ooooober can carry 4 people in 8 mins. If they could find somewhere to land that aerial bus that takes the space of one bus lengthwise and 3 buses widthwise. And then find somewhere in Manly to land.

Take your dreaming hands off it!

I completely agree. We already have point to point VTOL aircraft available. They are called helicopters. Now how many of those are buzzing around each day? Not that many really, only for the very rich, SAR and media ops.

Uber are looking at listing so this is all about share price building in my opinion. Hey what would I know, I am a moron.

https://www.thenational.ae/business/...-says-1.767505

https://www.ft.com/content/906ffd78-...1-d36dfef1b89a