What is the status of vertiports around the world?

But do vertiports, as outlined in visions of the future, really exist yet? Or are they just helipads with a tiny upgrade – like a charging station, or added noise reduction measures? It’s an understandable reaction when a headline announces our urban skylines are going to change forever to assume it won’t happen for several decades.

But all that changed on 11 February 2024 when Joby Aviation, a Californian-based producer of VTOL vehicles, confirmed it had reached a deal to launch air taxi services in the UAE within two years.

It is not the first major deal announced by the urban air mobility (UAM) sector – the Global Urban Air Mobility Market Map maintains an overview of ventures in 130 cities and regions in 55 countries across the world – but it promises to be the most significant.

Dubai confirms biggest VTOL deal yet

Joby Aviation’s deal in Dubai is significant for three reasons. Firstly, it gives the VTOL and vertiports technology an arrival date. Just two years away, it might even arrive before the end of 2025, so incredibly close compared to the timelines outlined by electric or hydrogen-powered passenger aircraft.

Secondly, the deal is underpinned by plans to build at least four brand new vertiports – so no, not helipad upgrades.

And finally, it gives the future of vertiports and VTOLs credibility – because the UAE, and other oil-rich states in the Middle East such as Saudi Arabia, is exactly the kind of place where the technology will face the least regulatory opposition.

These countries are already busy building the cities of the future – Joby Aviation’s taxi service will be based in the most famous of them, Dubai – which means vertiport and VTOL infrastructure can be incorporated early into the urban planning of these large-scale metropolises.

In June 2023, German urban air mobility (UAM) developer Volocopter confirmed it had carried out a series of air taxi test flights in the Saudi futuristic gigacity of Neom – but no concrete timeline has been detailed yet, although it is confident of obtaining type certification for its VoloCity air taxi this year.

The key to a successful air taxi service

Upon announcing its deal with Dubai’s Road and Transport Authority and British vertiport builder and facilitator Skyports, Joby Aviation identified the three ingredients crucial to successfully launching an air taxi service:

A definitive path to operations
Well-placed infrastructure supported by dedicated partners
An aircraft with the capacity and range to deliver meaningful journeys

The deal grants Joby Aviation, whose taxi can carry a pilot and passengers at speeds up to 320 km/h, the exclusive right to operate air taxis in Dubai for six years.

Meanwhile, Skyports will design, construct, own, and operate four vertiports, which will enable the air taxis to access key locations, including Dubai’s city centre, marina, and main airport, cutting typical local travel times by close to 80 percent.

Vertiports in the US, UK and Italy

Unsurprisingly, Skyports is also active in its homeland – work is ongoing to build an air taxi hub in the north London suburb of Brent Cross.

Another major UK player is Ferrovial Airports (which already has a deal to develop a network of more than 10 vertiports in Florida), which has partnered up with Grimshaw and Mott MacDonald to identify “demand-rich” sites suitable for up to 25 vertiports.

But will regulatory clearance be easy to acquire? It’s understood the UK Civil Aviation Authority is keen to introduce new legislation permitting aerodromes to accommodate eVTOL aircraft, but might be stalling on guidelines for new vertiports.

Similar efforts are ongoing in Italy where ITA Airways, Airbus, UrbanV and Enel are partnering up to promote and develop the Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) ecosystem. The eVTOL of choice is the CityAirbus NextGen.

Seven different types of vertiport

So what will the vertiports of the future look like? According to the Global Urban Air Mobility Market Map, there are seven different concepts of design:
The essential – the ‘vertiport in a box’ design. Modular and affordable, it’s a turn-key solution for smaller property sites
The simple – again a small and modular structure, it can be added quickly to existing airport infrastructure. The Skyports vertiport in Paris is likely to be such a design. Some 90 percent of current heliports/vertiports have a single-aircraft capacity
The elevated – typically an elegant design for a roof-top urban hub that requires complex engineering work and involved certification challenges
The enclosed – a design that surrounds the takeoff and landing area, thus minimising noise and weather disturbance. Room for future expansion is limited, though
The integrated – built in close proximity to an airport, the passenger experience becomes a seamless one, as they swap traditional air travel for an air taxi to the city centre
The urban hub – a large scale vertiport with multiple landing and take off positions
The UAM/AAM regional hub – a battery-electric inter-regional vertiport.

Are these the aircraft engines of the future?

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Rise of the vertiports: a look at recent developments concerning the futuristic air hubs