St. Pete task force readies path to future aviation through electric air taxis
Air taxis being studied for use in Bay Area
It?s the latest form of aviation, it?s electric and the city of St. Petersburg is making moves to bring it local. ?Briona Arradondo reports.
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - It’s the latest form of aviation, it’s electric and the city of St. Petersburg is making moves to bring it local.
The backstory:
Electric air vehicles are the future of aviation, and a group of aviation experts and community leaders are working together on a task force to bring them to the city of St. Petersburg.
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"It’s kind of like the cartoon ‘The Jetsons’ where you kind of get into a vehicle, at some point in time there may not be a driver, and it’s just to transport you from one point to another," said Ed Montanari, the chair of Advanced Air Mobility Taskforce for the St. Petersburg.
Electric vertical takeoff and landing vehicles or EVTOLS are on the minds of St.Pete leaders. The Advanced Air Mobility Taskforce has been meeting for months, with Montanari presenting the first of two progress reports last week. The former councilman first brought EVTOLS to the attention of city council last year, which led to the task force he currently chairs.
"We wanted to study where these vehicles could operate from the city of St. Petersburg’s point of view, we have one municipal airport," said Montanari.
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The air vehicles would operate out of Albert Whitted Airport and could fly to St. Pete-Clearwater Airport or Tampa International Airport. The city’s airport manager mentioned during a council meeting on August 7 that he is talking with the airports in the region.
"Bringing our tower manager over to talk some potential airspace and stuff, so there is some active dialogue going on," said Rich Lesniak, the airport manager for the city of St. Petersburg.
What we know:
The FAA is expected to certify the first EVTOL in the next year or two. St. Petersburg is looking to use them as air taxis, medical transports or to move cargo.
"A lot of the manufacturers are pairing up with different airlines, some of them are cargo-related. So, you’ve got big cargo carriers like UPS, Federal Express, Amazon," said Montanari.
They look like a mix of a plane or helicopter and a drone, and eventually will be autonomous.
"As the battery technology improves, these vehicles are going to have longer and longer range," he said.
What's next:
Montanari is making sure St. Petersburg is set up and ready to go once air taxis are approved. The next step comes on August 25, when the task force will meet with a company to talk about manufacturers.
"They’re going to come to our task force and talk to us about the industry, what these companies are doing, what these vehicles are going to look like, how they’re going to operate and what infrastructure needs they need to have," said Montanari.
The task force will present its second progress report in November, and members are scheduled to give city leaders a final layout of air mobility in January 2026.
The Source: The information in this story was gathered by FOX 13’s Briona Arradondo.