Not only Miyazaki’s animated characters dream about flying, but so does Toyota. As the latter are more down-to-earth, their cars will not be literally flying but hovering above the ground.
It was announced by Hiroyoshi Yoshiki, the managing officer with company’s technical administration group, at Bloomberg's Next Big Thing Summit. Sure enough, all details are scant at this stage; however, the operating principle of the car will be similar to that used by an air-cushion vehicle. According to Yoshiki, it should allow reducing friction and enhancing fuel efficiency.
Well, a bicycle had to be invented one day also. Judging by the pace of technological advancement, such means of transportation might appear in the coming decades. However, there was no word when we should expect a flying vehicle to arrive.
Let’s not forget that similar projects already exist; however, none of them has been certified. Road traffic is rather messy even now and we don’t need traffic jams in the air. So far, there are similar projects developed by the American-based company Terrafugia Transition and a Slovak engineer Stefan Klein, who used carbon fibre to build his Aeromobil. It can accelerate up to 200 km/h in the air.
No information about any similar projects has been announced in Russia so far, the only news was about a helicopter taxi.
