During the last the Geneva Motor Show, French aircraft manufacturer Airbus and Italian design company Italdesign recently unveiled their brand new modular transportation system Pop.UP for urban environments. This new transportation system features an incredible aircraft-car and a flexible system supporting the vehicle.


Pop.UP is made up of three parts. The carbon fiber ground hosting wheels and green energy for the car to run. The capsule where two people can seat in comfortably and a drone-like air module, equipped with eight counter-rotating motors to life the vehicle up in the air. When the ground part and the capsule are connected, the vehicle turns into a smart city car. If a person wants to get up up and away he or she could simply call on an air module from their smart devices, to come and pick the vehicle up. The design looks extremely sleek. While the system sounds complex, the three-part-module system seems to be quite smart working and well incorporated.


And there’s more. Pop.UP is supposed to be driving fully by itself, supported by an artificial intelligence platform. That means our tasks as human to enjoy a ride is reduced to sitting there and look outside the big windows. The system, according to the promotional video, also works with smart VR glasses and other intelligent devices. Once you sit in, the system is supposed to know your level of happiness and stress from your facial expressions and will design a traveling plan to suit your current mood. So you can sit back and relax, while the smart vehicle transform between car and a private plane. In merely 9.4 minutes you could be 50 miles away from the noisy city, meeting a friend in the woods for a picnic.


The smart self-driving system is only a concept, for now. The companies did not reveal any date of releasing or any plan to make it commercially available. Would you feel safe in the passenger seat of Pop.UP? Maybe you will find out in a not so far future.



Source: Inhabitat. Image: Italdesign

Enjoying this story? Show it to us!

0 Likes

Share your thoughts and join the technology debate!

Be the first to comment

More like this