Flying cars are closer to becoming a reality than you might think.
If you attended the TedxKC event, the subject line this morning may be familiar to you. Defy Impossible was the title and theme for TedxKC held here in Kansas City on Tuesday, August 20, 2013, at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts.
It definitely lived up to the world-renowned Ted brand and tagline – Ideas Worth Spreading. Talk topics that night ranged from the latest findings in neuroscience, to new ways to produce art, to inspiring programs for helping the homeless find purpose and energy.
One of the more fascinating, practical, and funnier speakers was Jared Ficklin of frog design. He’s billed as an inventor, maker and designer. The name of his presentation was called “We were promised flying cars” and he laid out a very interesting mass transit solution.
Ficklin started by highlighting two of the main reasons we often resist public transportation: 1) mass transit schedules can be inconvenient and require too much adaptation for our lifestyles, and 2) we don’t like to give up the quiet privacy of cars – we like to preserve our personal space.
He then put a picture of a ski lift map up on screen. The capacity of a large ski lift system allows it to move about 7 million people up a mountain in one day. Comparatively, the New York City subway system moves about 5.3 million daily.
Ficklin then presented a concept he and a design partner are calling the Urban Wire – a system of 4- or 6-person gondola cars, cables and towers that could literally transform the capacity, convenience and economics of public transportation.
The Urban Wire has some very solid legs under it:
- Estimated costs to build are 50 percent less than light rail or subways – no expensive underground tunnels or bridges necessary.
- No surface street capacity is sacrificed – gondolas ride above the street – in right-of-way airspace that is readily available.
- Cars come along every few seconds so no schedules to worry about.
- You get to ride privately in your own gondola, or at least with only a few strangers rather than hundreds.
- These systems already exist and work very well in other countries around the world.
So while this talk has little to do with our daily business disciplines of sales, marketing, operations and finance, I thought it was just plain cool and yet another good source of inspiration leading to innovation. You can see Ficklin’s presentation below by advancing to 2:34 in the timeline.
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