Say goodbye to Melbourne traffic jams because Uber has just announced Melbourne as the first international market for Uber Air which allows passengers to hail a helicopter.
Melbourne will join Dallas and Los Angeles as pilot cities for the program, with test flights due to start from 2020 and plans for
commercial operations to commence from 2023.
Taking Uber’s tech to the sky, Uber’s vision is to “open up urban air mobility, and help alleviate congestion on the ground”.
This could eventually see thousands of people transferred across cities for the same price as an UberX trip over the same distance. Yep, helicopter transfers won’t just be for the rich and famous anymore.
Susan Anderson, Regional General Manager for Uber in Australia, New Zealand and North Asia made the announcement at Uber’s global Elevate Summit in Washington.
“Australian governments have adopted a forward-looking approach to ridesharing and future transport technology. This, coupled with Melbourne’s unique demographic and geospatial factors, and culture of innovation and technology, makes Melbourne the perfect third launch city for Uber Air,” she said.
“We will see other Australian cities following soon after.”
Eric Allison, the global head of Uber Elevate said “as major cities grow, the heavy reliance on private car ownership will not be sustainable”.
“Uber Air holds enormous potential to help reduce road congestion. For example, the 19 kilometre journey from the CBD to Melbourne airport can take anywhere from 25 minutes to around an hour by car in peak hour but with Uber Air this will take around 10 minutes”.
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