It's 2010 -- Where's my Flying Car?

[Logan Darklighter]

Am I the only one who thinks that cheap and commonly available flying cars would be a horribly bad idea, and there's no way in hell that the FAA will ever allow it to come to pass?

No, you're not.
We've had the technology for flying cars for well over a decade now. It's just that everything you saw on the cover of an old issue of Nova is not actually a good idea.
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Epsilon

Had the technology? Well... not so much, really.
But still, your point still stands that having publicly available flying cars would be a MONUMENTALLY bad idea. I'm with you there.
Hell, I seriously believe about 1/3 to 1/2 of the people driving on the ground shouldn't be allowed to drive, much less issued licenses for anything moving through the air.
The only way that flying cars would be viable - especially in cities - would be if it was mandatory to slave your controls to a central "flight control" system. Just punch in a destination and let the car (and the system) do the work.
Then there's the maintenance angle. My dad has owned quite a few light aircraft over the years. Light aircraft aren't built to the same "planned obsolescence" standards
as cars. You can't afford to be sloppy about these things. He found that out one day about 20 years ago when he failed to do a full pre-flight check, including checking the fuel mixture, took off and the plane DIED on him at just under 2000 ft altitude. He was lucky and had good reflexes and found a place to set the plane down. But that just goes to show the unforgiving nature of things. If you break down in a car, you pull over to the side. If something knocks your engine out in a plane, you'd better hope you can glide down. Even a helicopter can auto rotate down.
A flying car? Presumably a vehicle that only flies because of it's engine? You'd better have a DAMN reliable safety system ( a really BIG parachute) in place to deal with engine failure. And the engines themselves need to be as reliable as you can make them. The whole system needs to be. And because of that, you can't build anything half-ass or people will die and you'll be sued out of existence.
Because of that, the individual units may last longer than cars. MUCH longer with proper maintenance. My dad's current plane, a Cessna 170, was built circa 1961 and looks like it came off the factory floor. Go to any small airport and look around. 80% of those small planes out there? Probably made before 1970.
Then again, maybe I'm using the wrong example after all. I'm comparing classic light aircraft (which are still something a middle class individual can hope to afford) to the concept of the "flying car" when maybe a more apt comparison would be to helicopters. Now THOSE are incredible maintenance hogs! The wear and tear on the blades and moving parts is incredible. After a certain point the FAA requires the engines and components to be taken out of service. Whether it seems like they could go on or not. Remember the jet-bike that some of us found as a real life example of Looney Toons bike? The one that Jay Leno owns? The engine in that is a decommissioned Helicopter turbine. It runs just fine. But the FAA would never let it be put back on a helicopter.
I imagine that much the same thing would apply to the engines and systems of a "flying car". So that prices them more and more out of the range of ordinary people. Not many private individuals own and operate helicopters. The costs are too prohibitive.
Who would most likely use flying cars if they existed?
Look at who owns and operates helicopters. Police departments, rescue services and high end corporate and government transport. As well as the military. That's your market for a flying car. Particularly in urban high-rise environments.
Of course, if we develop reliable anti-gravity that could be used in a car sized vehicle, all bets are off. (Aside from the air traffic control angle, which still stands.)