How Close Are We to Flying Cars? | How Sci-Fi Inspired Science

You're stuck on the highway, bumper-to-bumper traffic. A commute that should have taken a few minutes has now somehow become an hour-long endeavor. And this happens. We all have one of two thoughts: one, monster truck; or two, wish I could just fly over this mess.

Great news! Some of science's greatest minds are saying we already have them. We already have flying cars. They call helicopters. Well, that's not quite what we meant, Neal, but let's find out how the science fiction of the flying car we all know and love may be closer than you think to a science reality.

Sci-fi has long imagined that flying cars would zip around unencumbered by traffic. In Star Wars, Blade Runner, and The Fifth Element, flying cars just seemed right. While flying cars once seemed inevitable, they haven't quite caught on yet, even though inventors have been trying for decades now. Companies like Uber are developing airborne ride-sharing, but the infrastructure and regulations don't yet exist to support it.

But maybe flight isn't our only solution to traffic. For you men who are always late to the office, we have this built-in auto. What we're really looking for is found time. That's where sci-fi has been way ahead of us—with the self-driving car.

"Drive engage! May I suggest you put the car in the auto cruise mode for safety's sake?"

"No, you may not."

The self-driving car may soon be a common reality. Google, Tesla, Ford, Uber, and others have been developing self-driving cars for years. Cities including Paris and Beijing are testing self-driving cars on the road, and Wham-O has released a fleet of truly driverless taxis in Phoenix, Arizona. The cars use sensors and complex algorithms to navigate and avoid collisions.

Problems have cropped up with some test projects, including crashes, a pedestrian death, and even violence towards the cars, which could be typical road rage or the quirks of interacting with AI, which sci-fi also predicted.

So the next time you're feeling that road rage, take a deep breath, inhale, exhale, and know that the flying cars are coming soon.