A flying car is a type of personal air vehicle that provides door-to-door transportation by both road and air. many prototypes have been built since the first years of the twentieth century, but production status has still yet to be reached.  Remember the future? That was that time when each of us would navigate our own personal aircraft through three-dimensional lanes of commuter traffic. It’s a dream that goes way, way back: In November 1933, when Eugene Vidal (Gore’s father) was working for Franklin Roosevelt’s Commerce Department, he proposed awarding $1 million to anyone who could invent a flying car, a $700 “poor man’s airplane.” No one could. It seemed plausible, but the technology just wasn’t there. 

Larry Page's flying car
Google co-founder Larry Page revealed to be owner of Opener, a Canadian startup that just came out of stealth. Still, it was a dream many of us have shared, prompted by sci-fi and having watched rocket packs shudder upward and away while lusting after something more.


Like many of us, Gwen Lighter, the CEO and founder of the GoFly competition, has been fascinated with flight and its pioneers since childhood. So, I continued to read about hero innovators and their breakthrough technologies, and I began focusing on recent advances in control and stability systems, propulsion, lightweight materials, energy, and rapid prototyping. I realized that the convergence of these breakthrough technologies would open up innovation to engineers around the globe. That was when I knew that we had reached the technological moment when we had the ability to make that childhood dream of personal flight a reality. That was the moment that GoFly was born.



She’s referring to the GoFly Challenge, a three-phase competition sponsored by Boeing meant to spur—at long last—the development of our flying cars, or flying bikes. Whatever, we’re not choosy. Never mind for the moment the climate imperative of transitioning away from private vehicles and toward more environmentally benign mass transit solutions. Never mind moving road rage into mid-air. This is the long-promised future of our past beckoning, and there’s undeniably cool science involved.



The GoFly organization includes a number of aviation experts on hand to mentor and assist design teams throughout the competition. In addition, with entry into the contest comes certain benefits, including —let’s face it, they need it— insurance. The goal of the GoFly challenge is to design and ultimately deploy a vehicle that meets certain requirements. It must be: safe, quiet, ultra-compact, be a near-vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) device, be capable of flying 20 miles while carrying a single person. The contest is structured into three distinct phases, with prizes awarded at each level.

The shape of the contest
Up to ten $20,000 prizes awarded based on a written report. These are the winners recently announced. The hierarchy of disagreement: The best and worst argument techniquesThe hierarchy of disagreement. The best and worst argument techniques. The Mystery of Jesus’s Brother Gets Even WeirderThe Mystery of Jesus’s Brother Gets Even Weirder, 4 personality types of decision making, according to game theory4 personality types of decision making, according to game theory

Last phase
Up to four $50,000 prizes awarded based on revised Phase I material (or for new teams new Phase I material) and demonstrated performance of progress to date. Here they are in alphabetical order by design team, along with their nation of origin.