Uncovering New Opportunities for Ultra Short Takeoff and Landing Aircraft for Regional Air Mobility Services

Ultra Short Aircraft may provide a transformative mobility solution for communities whose nearest airport with scheduled commercial air service is not convenient. Ultra Short Aircraft promise to improve the performance capabilities of STOL and eSTOL vehicles while achieving higher levels of safety, higher cruise speeds, a reduced environmental footprint, and the ability to operate from runways as short as 150 feet. This study investigates Ultra Short air service opportunities in the Northeast Corridor, focusing on neighborhoods far from existing certificated airport infrastructure. The research begins with a county-to-county analysis to identify areas with populations located more than 15 minutes away from an airport with commercial air service. Routes with the potential for significant passenger volumes are then investigated for further evaluation and for the estimation of travel time savings. In the second step, the analysis is refined to examine demand at a finer resolution using census tract granularity. Clustering analysis is performed to aggregate tracts into promising clusters for the siting of dedicated infrastructure. The outcome of this research is the identification of promising origin-destination pairs for Ultra Short regional air mobility, thereby providing critical insights into the potential market for these services.