Urban Air Mobility

Environmental Life-cycle Assessment of Passenger Transportation: A Detailed Methodology for Energy, Greenhouse Gas and Criteria Pollutant Inventories of Automobiles, Buses, Light Rail, Heavy Rail and Air

Chester, Mikhail
Horvath, Arpad
2007

The passenger transportation modes of auto, bus, heavy rail, light rail and air are critical systems relied upon for business and leisure. When considering their environmental effects, most studies and policy focus on the fuel use of the vehicles, and ignore the energy and other resource inputs and environmental outputs from the life cycles of necessary infrastructures, fuels, and vehicles. The goal of this project is to develop comprehensive life-cycle assessment (LCA) models to quantify the energy inputs and emissions from autos, buses, heavy rail, light rail and air transportation in...

Future of Aviation: Advancing Aerial Mobility through Technology, Sustainability, and On-Demand Flight

Cohen, Adam
Shaheen, Susan, PhD
2023

Advanced air mobility (AAM) is a broad concept enabling consumers access to air mobility, cargo and package delivery, healthcare applications, and emergency services through an integrated and connected multimodal transportation network. AAM includes local use cases of about a 50-mile radius in rural or urban areas and intraregional use cases of up to approximately 500 miles that occur within or between urban and rural areas. The Future of Aviation Conference: Advancing Aerial Mobility through Technology, Sustainability, and On-Demand Flight was held in person at the San Francisco...

The Potential Societal Barriers of Urban Air Mobility (UAM)

Shaheen, Susan, PhD
Cohen, Adam
Farrar, Emily
2018

Urban Air Mobility (UAM) is an emerging concept of air transportation where small package delivery drones to passenger-carrying air taxis operate over populated areas, from small towns to the largest cities are being considered. This could revolutionize the way people move within and around cities by shortening commute times, bypassing ground congestion, and enabling point-to-point flights across cities. In recent years, several companies have designed and tested enabling elements of this concept, including; prototypes of Vertical Take-Off Landing (VTOL) capable vehicles, operational...

Urban Air Mobility: Opportunities and Obstacles

Cohen, Adam
Shaheen, Susan
2021

Urban Air Mobility (UAM, also known as advanced air mobility) is an emerging concept that envisions a safe, sustainable, affordable, and accessible air transportation system for emergency management, cargo delivery, and passenger mobility within or traversing a metropolitan area. While numerous societal concerns have been raised about these approaches (e.g., privacy, safety, security, social equity), on-demand aviation has the potential to provide options for emergency services, goods delivery, and passenger mobility in urban and rural areas using small piloted and autonomous aircraft....

A Legal and Regulatory Assessment for the Potential of Urban Air Mobility (UAM)

Serrao, Jaqueline
Nilsson, Sarah
Kimmel, Shawn
2018

Urban Air Mobility (UAM) is an emerging concept of air transportation where small package delivery drones to passenger-carrying air taxis operate over populated areas, from small towns to the largest cities are being considered. This could revolutionize the way people move within and around cities by shortening commute times, bypassing ground congestion, and enabling point-to-point flights across cities. In recent years, several companies have designed and tested enabling elements of this concept, including; prototypes of Vertical Take-Off Landing (VTOL) capable vehicles, understanding of...

Mobility on Demand Planning and Implementation: Current Practices, Innovations, and Emerging Mobility Futures

Shaheen, Susan
Cohen, Adam
Broader, Jacquelyn
Davis, Richard
Brown, Les
Neelakantan, Radha
Gopalakrishna, Deepak
2020

This report provides Mobility on Demand (MOD) planning and implementation practices and tools to support communities. The report discusses different stakeholders in the MOD ecosystem and the role of partnerships in filling spatial, temporal, and other service gaps. Additionally, the report discusses how MOD can be integrated into transportation planning and modeling. The report also discusses shared mobility implementation considerations, such as rights-of-way management, multimodal integration, data sharing, equity, labor impacts, and the role of pilot evaluations. Finally, the report...

An Assessment of the Potential Weather Barriers of Urban Air Mobility (UAM)

Reiche, Colleen PhD
Brody, Frank
McGillen, Christian
Siegel, Joel
Cohen, Adam
2018

Urban Air Mobility (UAM) is an emerging concept of air transportation where small package delivery drones to passenger-carrying air taxis operate over populated areas from small towns to the largest cities. This could revolutionize the way people move within and around cities by shortening commute times, bypassing ground congestion, and enabling point-to-point flights across cities. In recent years, several companies have designed and tested enabling elements of this concept, including; prototypes of Vertical Take-Off Landing (VTOL) capable vehicles, understanding of operational concepts,...

Advanced Air Mobility Community Integration Considerations Playbook

Cohen, Adam
Hasan, Shahab
Mendonca, Nancy L.
Wulff, Yolanka
2023

Aviation is undergoing rapid change due to advancements in technology, new business models, changing consumer preferences, and other trends. These trends are poised to change the way people travel by air. Advanced air mobility (AAM) is a broad concept focusing on leveraging these trends to include routine aviation mobility in urban, suburban, and rural communities. NASA envisions AAM as safe, sustainable, accessible, and affordable aviation for transformational local and intraregional missions. But it’s worth noting that this vision, AAM associated terms, and even the definition of AAM...

Urban Air Mobility Market Study

Reiche, Colleen PhD
Goyal, Rohit
Cohen, Adam
Serrao, Jaqueline
Kimmel, Shawn, PhD
Fernando, Chris
Shaheen, Susan, PhD
2018

The Booz Allen Team explored market size and potential barriers to Urban Air Mobility (UAM) by focusing on three potential markets – Airport Shuttle, Air Taxi, and Air Ambulance. We found that the Airport Shuttle and Air Taxi markets are viable, with a significant total available market value in the U.S. of $500 billion, for a fully unconstrained scenario. In this unconstrained best-case scenario, passengers would have the ability to access and fly a UAM at any time, from any location to any destination, without being hindered by constraints such as weather, infrastructure, or traffic...

Advanced Air Mobility: Opportunities, Challenges, and Research needsfor the State of California (2023-2030)

Cohen, Adam
Shaheen, Susan, PhD
2024

Advanced air mobility (AAM) is a broad concept that enables consumers access to air mobility, goods delivery, and emergency services through an integrated and connected multimodal transportation network. AAM can provide short-range urban, suburban, and rural flights of about 50-miles and mid-range regional flights up to a several hundred miles. State law delegates responsibility for oversight in aviation primarily to the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans). This white paper presents an overview of the state of the market, such as the aircraft under development and forecast...