There are, however, a few caveats: one, the vehicle can only carry two passengers, and two, it operates on a tank of premium unleaded gas. Not quite the innovatory vehicle some have been anticipating, at least on the “green” energy front. A complete and fully operating prototype is expected sometime this year, and the vehicle could potentially hit the market as early as 2009 or 2010.
Dietrich affirms, “We have a lot of confidence that if the interest is there, we can deliver this product. There is a huge amount of general interest, but the question is ‘Is there a market for it?’”
The biggest challenge in designing a flying vehicle will be the smaller amenities passengers have become accustomed to with road travel, especially cargo space. Given the nascent nature of the technology, it seems likely that the first personal air vehicles will only be able to accommodate the barest of essentials. Currently, the most viable models being pushed by developers are known as the SkyRider, Skycar, and CityHawk.
Of course, there will be other hurdles which will need to be sufficiently tested before flying cars become mainstream. For example, without a properly functioning and safe airway system or route plan to travel, flying a car will be restricted to very closed personal spaces. Then there are the other logistics of air traffic laws, signals, violations, and the inevitable accidents, which would surely pose hitherto unfathomed challenges for lawmakers. Expect parachutes to be standard on any such air vehicle.
Terrafugia is also quick to note that the airborne automobile is hardly a new idea or an unfeasible one: an inventor named Molt Taylor created prototypes as far back as the 1950s and 1960s. Glenn Curtiss, who in 1917 revealed the first known design of a flying car, is commonly referred to as the “father of the flying car.” Other designs and prototypes, including the Arrowbile (1937), Airphibian (1946), Convaircar (1947), Avrocar, and Aerocar came and went without success, often claiming the lives of their inventors in the testing process. Ingenuity was not in short supply, though market demand and production costs proved too overwhelming to turn the concept into reality.
