Urban Airspace Mapping Capabilities for Designing Safe Urban Air Mobility Operations

The Innovation Laboratory, Inc.nbsp;develops urban airspace mapping capabilities that are needed to support the future ofnbsp;Urban Air Mobility (UAM).nbsp; UAM is envisioned to provide a safe, efficient, and flexible system for air vehicles, possibly autonomous or remotely piloted (Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS)), to move passengers and cargo (packages) within a metropolitan area.nbsp; These mapping capabilities willnbsp;support the needs of UAS service suppliers (USSs) to utilizenbsp;macro level three dimensional (3D) volumes for safe UAS Trajectory-Based Operations (TBO) between locations and within a cityscape.nbsp; These mapping capabilities will allow for local and state agencies to evaluate the complimentary challenges, impacts, and tradeoffs of proposed UAM-enabled air-based and traditional land-based mobility.nbsp; We build upon well-established urban planning methods to assess impacts of urban mobility projects on urban infrastructures, urban resources, and public safety.nbsp; Wenbsp;research the attributes needed in urban airspace maps to enable safe, high volume, UAS operations in a physically constrained urban airspace.nbsp; Leveraging an existing mature urban planning software system, we build new visualization quot;layersquot; required for urban airspace mapping see how various airspace operations constraints, traffic volumes, or design structures will impact UAM operations in the airspace and its interfacing ground-space using new analyses and metrics developed in this SBIR.