It is late afternoon in Manhattan and you have a flight to catch at Kennedy International Airport. Instead of sitting in rush-hour traffic for two hours, you take a short ride to a nearby parking garage where you board an electric plane that takes off vertically from the roof and you arrive at Kennedy 20 minutes later for roughly the same cost as a fancy ride-share. You make your flight in time.
While it might sound impractical, several companies say they are on the edge of being able to offer a safe, cheap, clean electric plane that can help passengers travel distances between two and 150 miles without the need for a conventional runway. Public and private experts believe the technology could grow into a massive market that helps mitigate over-crowding and changes the way people travel in major urban areas.
While urban air travel is currently out of reach for most customers, improvements in battery technology have driven down the cost of developing electric-powered planes that are practicable as urban passenger transportation. These companies are betting they can bring electric urban and regional air travel to the masses, and have developed the new plane to compete for a slice of this emerging market within the next few years.
The new electric plane uses one-fifth the energy of conventional helicopters. Unlike traditional fixed-wing plane, they won’t require runways to take off and land. Unlike helicopters, they will be largely unhearable from the ground and have multiple rotors (旋翼) and backup systems, making them much safer.
Adam Goldstein, the co-chief executive of Archer Aviation, said his company hopes to offer fares in the range of three to four dollars per mile traveled. That would make the trip from Manhattan to Kennedy, typically 17 miles, between $50 and $80. Several experts predicted the price of regional flights would be around the same cost as the luxury car service Uber Black.
“The biggest cost is the batteries,” said Mr. Goldstein, “which are high-priced, but get cheaper every day.”
【小题1】What is the purpose of the first paragraph?| A．To give advice on avoiding rush-hour traffic. |
| B．To introduce a new way of travelling. |
| C．To discuss how to cut down travel cost. |
| D．To explore how an electric plane works. |
| A．Increase. | B．Remove. | C．Ease. | D．Maintain. |
| A．Its size. | B．Its flight route. |
| C．Its way of taking off. | D．Its travel distance. |
| A．It has a promising future. | B．It is too expensive to build. |
| C．It will take the place of helicopters. | D．It will come on the market in a few months. |
