Regalpony
Flying Cars or Drive / Flying Gyroplanes
There's a pioneer spirit to this page.

It's been several years since we've considered flying to work and back home. We've seen spiralling fuel prices and alternative fuel systems *1 have become popular again for cars in the market place.

The age of the flying car will come like a lamb, not a lion. Slowly but surely entrepreneurs will be trying out commuting from their rural homes into a rural workplace. Anyone using a major highway now, who chooses to fly to work and back will reduce their presence in a congested system. It will be the older workforce that has the finances and the opportunity to make it happen.

Replacing the current form of individual transportation is key to improving the whole transportation network. The cost savings of not having to add roads and highways to our current system will be enormous. Current road systems will have new found resources to improve their appearance. Moneys once spent on new road and bridge construction will be reallocated for repair.

A Vision of Commuting to Work by Driving and Flying
The ideal situation for commuting to work would be to step out of your house and into a flying car. Of course that's where the question has to be asked. Why would you want a flying car if you intend to fly to work? The ideal vehicle would in reality have to be a driveable aircraft. Something that is as economical to purchase and maintain as the family sedan.
This is not as far fetched as you might think. Across the www over the last few years there has been a buzz of anticipation over who would be the first commuter to step out of their home and into a gyroplane, to travel to work.
Obviously there are some considerations that must be addressed. But in the event it does happen soon it will likely be from a rural property to a rural industrial park.

Let's address the flying car vs. the driveable plane.
A flying car is just too heavy to make it feasible. Most previous attempts ended up striping the vehicle down to bare metal inside to reduce weight, then add wings, a tail and some kind of propeller to move it. Since such a vehicle will spend most of it's useful life in the air, a flying car doesn't make too much sense. Many people like to refer to the George Jetson flying car which was a cartoon. However the designers of that series didn't draw a flying car, rather they drew a small vehicle with a bubble top. This is very much like a gyroplane, which is the correct starting point to take: a driveable airframe. Something that already fly's well is easier to modify for short road trips, than to modify a car to fly. -> Sky Lanes

Does this mean we'll never see a real flying car?
We will see a real flying car soon, several, as a matter of fact, however they will be affordable to only the very wealthy. Also they will mostly be with aeroplane wings rather than using autorotation as found in the gyroplane.

Offsite Links:
Terafugia: aeroplane car with wings
Milner Motors Aircar with wings
Historical Aerocar ref.: (video) flying car and Aerocar: (colour video) dropping off plane parts
Aerocar ref.: (website) News: Aerocar
Aerocar: Old and New Idea (website)