The urban air mobility (UAM) concept revolves around the use of highly automated aircraft (e.g. drones) to transport goods and people in urban and suburban areas. These aircraft fly at low altitudes, and are usually associated with the use of electric motors for propulsion, to achieve sustainable flights with no emissions during operation.
Urban air mobility is a new concept which, although still in research phase, is rapidly evolving and taking shape. To support it, the SESAR Joint Undertaking has defined the U-Space Blueprint (1), “a set of new services and specific procedures designed to support safe, efficient and secure access to airspace for large numbers of drones”, which should eventually help to enable UAM and drone operation in urban environments in the EU. Moreover, UAM is supported by the Urban-Air-Mobility Initiative Cities Community (UIC2) (3), while the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) has started developing a regulatory framework for it (4).
Figure 1:UAM ecosstem for the AiRMOUR project (5)
There are different types of use cases for UAM, with the most prominent ones being (2):
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Air taxis: this application foresees the use of automated drones for fast and efficient passenger transport for short distance, within the urban context (a)(b).
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Goods deliveries: delivery of goods using automated drones, also for faster deliveries, while reducing road congestion (5). Delivery of medical supplies (e.g. samples and drugs) is an important application for this use case (c).
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Infrastructure inspection: assessing the integrity of core infrastructure can be complemented with the use of drones, especially in the case of difficult to access locations, which can lead to reduced cost of operations (d).
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Public safety and security: drones can be used for police and firefighter emergency services, when a fast response is required, and when there might be the need for assessment of safety in dangerous situations, before a ground crew intervenes (d).
Challenges for full deployment of UAM includes integrating its infrastructure elements, such as vertical ports (vertiports) and landing pads, into the city especially from the point of urban planning, as well as the air traffic management systems and infrastructure needed to keep drone operations safe and reliable. Another issue of concern is the noise generated by the aircraft, which should be at an acceptable level for the urban environment.
Figure 2: AMU-LED airspace structure (6)
MATURITY:
Maturity of solutions and technologies in UAM can be related to a diverse array of elements in the framework, such as technological maturity of drones, or the presence and maturity of the required infrastructure to support UAM. There is high technological maturity for electrical drones and other small electrical aircraft built for UAM, with (limited) commercial availability. However, the biggest challenge is their automated operation and integration into cities and legislative structures (e).
For this purpose, SESAR JU has defined 4 sets of services for U-Space (U1 to U4) (1), which are directly related to the level of drone automation and their connectivity. Levels U1 (foundation services, such as electronic registration and identification of drones and geofencing) and U2 (initial services, such as support for drone operations, including flight planning) have already been implemented in pilot locations, while U3 (advanced services, such as complex and numerous operations in dense areas, with collision detection) is expected to be deployed and demonstrated in 2025, while U4 (full services, allowing integration with other transport modes and relying on a high level of connectivity and automation) is expected after 2030.
In (7), as part of the ASSURED-UAM (e) project, a technology readiness review has been carried out for the different elements of UAM. For the transport of goods, technology is more mature, with flight tests already ongoing, with test phases planned in fully urbanised areas. For personal transport, technologies are expected to become mature by 2025 and beyond, with wider adoption at the earliest by 2030.
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