Use case · Government planning
AAM Infrastructure Planning for State DOTs and Cities
Advanced air mobility will be planned before it is flown. For state departments of transportation and city governments, the decisions that matter most — where vertiports go, which corridors open first, and how public money is committed — are being made now, ahead of scaled aircraft operations.
Planning a mode with no historical data
Transportation agencies plan from observed demand, but AAM has none to observe: there are no ridership records for routes that have never flown. Agencies must nonetheless choose sites and corridors that touch zoning, noise-sensitive communities, environmental review, and existing airspace — and defend those choices in public processes.
The cost of guessing wrong is stranded infrastructure. A vertiport in the wrong place becomes a monument to a forecast that missed, while a network planned too conservatively cedes the mode's benefits to other regions. Public capital demands business cases that hold up, built on analysis rather than vendor enthusiasm.
Forecast demand before the first route opens
SkyPAATH™, LuftCar's AI planning platform, produces citywide and statewide demand forecasts for AAM planning, operational logistics, and revenue opportunity identification. Its coverage spans the demand sources agencies actually weigh: mobility from remote communities to urban centers, decongestion of interstates and city traffic, complementing existing mobility, cargo and last-mile delivery, and disaster relief.
Site and design vertiports planners can defend
SkyPAATH™ performs AI-driven vertiport site determination with digital-twin visualization built for urban planners, accounting for operational obstacles and for sensitivities to noise, environment, and safety risk. Its air corridor optimization plans demand-based routes across citywide and statewide networks while accounting for existing airports large and small, plus heliports — and its integrated vertiport design covers infrastructure for regional airports and urban centers, including refueling across SAF, hydrogen, and battery charging.
Experience inside real government programs
LuftCar is an active FDOT and TxDOT eIPP participant, positioned as an infrastructure provider for state-funded AAM corridor deployments in the United States. Internationally, the company delivered the Dubai Horizon II vertiport planning project for Dubai Municipality, developing AAM infrastructure solutions for a major UAE city, and operates a Dubai regional office delivering strategic planning and AAM readiness consulting, vertiport planning and design, and deployment of its AI planning platform.
Frequently asked questions
How can agencies forecast demand for a mode that does not exist yet?
By modeling rather than measuring: combining existing travel flows across modes, socioeconomic patterns, and multiple mission types — passenger, cargo, and medical — into scenario-based forecasts. The output is a range of defensible futures instead of a single guess.
What factors determine a good vertiport site?
Airspace access and obstacle clearance, ground transportation connections, utility capacity, land use and zoning, and proximity to noise-sensitive or environmentally sensitive areas. Digital-twin models let planners compare candidate sites against all of these factors before committing capital.
Where do state DOTs fit into AAM deployment?
State transportation departments are emerging as anchor institutions for AAM: they run corridor programs, coordinate with aviation authorities, and decide how infrastructure funding is applied. Cities then handle siting, zoning, and integration with local transit and land use.
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Glossary