Social Sustainable Urban Air Mobility in Europe

Tobias Biehle
Additional contact information
Tobias Biehle: Department of Work, Technology and Participation, Technische Universität Berlin, Marchstraße. 23, MAR 1-1, 10587 Berlin, Germany

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 15, 1-17

Abstract: The first step to steer passenger Urban Air Mobility (pUAM) towards the necessity of sustainability is to understand its impact on our urban transportation systems. This research emphasises the social footprint of passenger drones in scheduled operation as an early business model in European Functional Urban Areas. The literature review is guided by the corresponding Sustainable Urban Mobility Indicators (SUMI). The prospective impact which the introduction of pUAM has on the evaluation of European transportation systems regarding their affordability for the public, their inclusivity for mobility-impaired groups, their accessibility to commuters and the level of customer satisfaction is analysed. Furthermore, the impact of pUAM on the perceived quality of public urban space is examined. Results indicate the overall social footprint of passenger drones in European transport systems to be negative. Early market pUAM may lead to an unbalanced distribution of potential benefits, with services tailored to address only a limited number of citizens. Highlighting pathways for a societal benefiting technology, recommendations are provided for urban planning and city development.

Keywords: passenger UAM; urban planning; vertiports; affordability; inclusivity; accessibility; acceptance; satisfaction; SUMI (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/15/9312/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/15/9312/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2022:i:15:p:9312-:d:875326

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().