Thursday, December 17, 2020

LA Mayor Garcetti Aims At Air Taxi Future

In a bid to push LA into the high tech world of the Jetsons, Mayor Eric Garcetti said on Wednesday that he has kicked off an effort to make Los Angeles an "unmistakable leader on urban air mobility". According to the Mayor's office, it has launched an effort called the Urban Air Mobility Partnership, which will help visualization a "new piece of L.A.'s transportation network where people can go to fly on an urban air mobility aircraft." Garcetti said it hopes to see the introduction of low-noise, electric aircraft flying in Los Angeles airspace by 2023. The new effort is being financially supported by the Urban Air Mobility Division of Hyundai Motor Group, with plans to hire a "Urban Air Mobility Fellow" to champion the effort. The idea of high-flying air taxis has been popular; in 2017, Uber said it planned to have flying taxings in Los Angeles by 2020 (pictured); just last week, Uber sold its flying tax division to another company. Uber, for its part, had run some helicopter flights in New York City, but has yet to produce an actual flying vehicle.