YEAR POSTED: 2009
The future of the world will undoubtedly contain upgraded version of all transportation technology currently used and available plus some that are highly inconvenient and nonexistent. Such technologies will come with future varieties of cars, more aerodynamic trucks, faster trains, all around better air travel, and eventually, teleportation. These technologies will bring people from all parts of the world much closer together, a key factor in economic growth and the future of humanity's success.
History[]
The Wright Brothers[]
Orville (1871-1948) and Wilbur (1867-1912) Wright, two American bicycle manufacturers, were generally credited with the fist manned flight of a heavier-than-air aircraft with an engine. They flew their creation, Wright Flyer I, at Kill Devil Hills, four miles south of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, on December 17, 1903; five years before the first car was produced. Orville piloted the odd, backwards-looking aircraft with Wilbur closely trailing him on foot as he flew Wright Flyer over one hundred and twenty feet; the beginning of modern air travel.
The Airplane and War[]
The very first flying vehicle that was used to execute military intentions was the Wright Military Flyer, again connected to the Wright brothers. During World War I and World War II, military aircraft was extensively used for reconnaissance and targeted bombing. Ever since World War I, military aircraft have been used in excess in every single war the United States has fought in. It is incredibly uncomplicated to perceive why any such military would desire to use flying vehicles for any war situation.
Airplanes: 2020[]
In a mere ten years, airplanes will have increased in performance in a simple variety of ideas. The energy-wasting commercial airplanes that humanity have come to known over the past fifty years will be slowly replaced with increasingly energy-efficient models by Boeing and other airplane manufacturers. These fuels will be hybrids of typical jet fuels and algae-based fuels. Because of these cheaper fuels, the cost of an airline ticket will stay at current rates without inflation from economy.
Speed will only slightly increase in the next decade. Currently, the average commercial airliner travels at around five hundred miles per hour; it may possibly increase by as little as fifty miles per hour.
Airplanes: 2040[]
In thirty years, the modern airplane will have semi-drastically transformed into faster, leaner, cheaper, safer, greener, and blended-wing designed aircraft. Few designs will utilize a blended-wing stature but for those that do, expect a much cheaper airline ticket than today due to the fact that over six hundred people can fit on one trip. Airplane manufacturers are even designing these types of aircraft currently. Boeing has dubbed their concept Honeydew.
Faster commercial models will have the ability to achieve speeds of over Mach 2. No commercial plane has reached these speeds since the Aerospatiale-British Aerospace Corporation (BAC) Concorde and Tupolev Tu-144 era. This will become possible as the problem of sonic boom is solved. Only a few business and private jets will take advantage of scram-jets, allowing them to travel hypersonically in the upper atmosphere at over four thousand miles per hour.
Airplanes: 2060[]
In fifty long years, during the decade of the 2060s and beyond, most commercial aircraft will obtain blended-wing designs and have the ability to reach speeds of over Mach 12, or roughly nine thousand miles per hour. This would make a flight from Los Angeles to Paris require just one and a half hours of flight time. The reason for this existential speed is because of aircraft flight ceilings of the year 2060. They will travel at the very edge of the atmosphere where there is absolutely no air resistance to be found using super-velocity scram-jet engines. The fastest scramjets at Mach 25 can travel in space.
Airplanes of the future will be zero-polluting and require little to no maintenance. They will be one of the safest forms of travel due to technological and safety advancements. An average first class ticket from San Francisco to New York City will cost around five hundred dollars.