Excerpt from PhocusWire
Over centuries some of the world’s biggest and most influential cities sprang up around ports: London, New York, San Francisco. More recently whole economies began to spring up around airports. Tourism followed the same path, with a port and then an airport a prerequisite to receiving visitors.
Could all of this be about to change with the advent of eVTOL (electric vertical takeoff and landing) taxis? How we travel and explore the world is about to change forever. Hoteliers need to take note or risk being left, rather ironically, up in the air.
Why do small, vertical takeoff flying vehicles make such a difference? Because airports require massive amounts of space and regulation and cost to build, and they need to be relatively close to the main city to make any sense. And if you want to travel long distances, you don’t have any option but to use your local airport as the starting point.
By contrast vertical airports require a tiny amount of space (usually around 80 meters in diameter), and any noise impact is low compared with conventional airplanes or helicopters due to eVTOLs being 100% electric. Assuming you use renewable energy sources, they have zero emissions and, as they are electric, they also do not impact air pollution.
This means that a major city could have dozens or more such points of departure and arrival, with one urban airport having capacity for potentially hundreds of passengers a day. It also means that if your departure or arrival point is not in a city, you can quite likely land or take off right on (or near) the doorstep.
It is quite likely, however, that there will be many fixed routes, just like airplanes and trains, with departures pre-scheduled. This makes it paramount to get involved now if you desire to have an airport close to your property or on your property. Hoteliers could ask for permission to place these urban airports on top of buildings, or lobby to have them in a public space close by – or even floating on the sea in the case of resorts.
So what should hotels do to respond to this massive change? Ensuring you have your own vertical airport on, or very near to, the premises of all your properties is an obvious answer.
Guests are sure to prioritize such properties when booking, and this will become a filter category in any search. You might even be able to make revenue from charging for access to non-guests or your competitors and charge premiums for the convenience to be close to an urban airport.
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