Flying Cars and the Dream That Won’t Die
Airborne vehicles are always just a few years away
Everyone has a moment when they want a flying car. Perhaps it was after watching the old Jetsons cartoon, or a chase scene from Blade Runner, Star Wars, or one of a hundred other sci-fi movies. For me, it was getting an up-close view of the four-engine ruby red Skycar sitting in a warehouse in Davis, California.
I remember thinking when I visited inventor Paul Moller nearly 20 years ago that this thing really was the future of transportation. Imagine climbing into an 865-horsepower aircraft that could take off like a hovercraft and fly like a plane. The Skycar’s sleek chassis and swooping tail fins looked more like a Batplane than a jet. Of course, the day I visited, Moller said Skycar’s engine was being tested, so I couldn’t take a ride. But it was only a matter of time, Moller promised, before Skycar would enter commercial production.
Moller’s dream never materialized. Neither I nor his many investors ever got that ride. The Canadian entrepreneur, whose Skycar graced the covers of dozens of magazines in the 1990s, filed for personal bankruptcy in 2009. The firm he started still makes industrial engines, but the only place to find a Skycar is on eBay. The real one was put up for sale last year for $400,000, but you can buy a die-cast…
