NASA working on vertiports where flying taxis could take off or land

NASA's Advanced Air Mobility mission (AAM) is working on different elements to help make flying taxis a reality and one of these focus areas is vertiports - where an AAM vehicle could take off and land in the future.

The mission is investigating where these vertiports or vertiplexes - multiple vertiports in proximity - will work into existing infrastructure like current airports and heliports. Work is also being done to investigate new landing areas that can be created from repurposed areas, purpose-built sites or integrated into existing buildings such as a train or bus station.

In addition to vertiport, NASA's AAM mission is working on other elements including automation, noise, vehicle design, and airspace design to keep everyone safe while flying in the skies together.

• NASA's High Density Vertiplex subproject is developing a vertiport automation system and using small remotely piloted aircraft to assess how vertiport automation can enhance the safety and efficiency of operations. HDV will initially test these smaller remotely piloted aircraft, but will progress to larger VTOL aircraft.
• The System-Wide Safety project is researching advanced safety management systems aimed at reducing vertiport hazards and risks.
• The National Campaign subproject is developing a Mobile Vertipad System to increase safety and precision during various types of testing where different industry vehicles could take off and land on the vertipad.

Flying taxis? It's more realistic than you might think. @NASAAero is working on "vertiports" where electric aircraft could take off and land, even on the tops of buildings in cities.https://t.co/sFkVOS5BB5 pic.twitter.com/33RRvOSqaF

— NASA (@NASA) April 25, 2022