Modern problems call for modern solutions — or so thinks PT Dirgantara Indonesia, which has announced plans to tackle Bali’s notorious traffic jams with air taxis. The company says it will have a prototype — half-drone, half-airplane — ready by 2026, capable of vertical take-off, with commercial operations targeted for 2028.
The proposed aircraft will reach speeds of up to 250 km/h, carry a maximum load of 550 kg, and fly up to 100 km — just enough to whisk you from the airport to your villa in Uluwatu or Canggu.
Building flying taxis, of course, isn’t the same as building roads — though the idea is intriguing. Nearly four years ago, another company made a similar pitch, but the skies over Bali remain mostly the domain of local kites and the occasional helicopter.
The biggest challenge may lie in regulatory conservatism. A pilot friend of mine once spent seven years trying to launch seaplane flights to the nearby Gili Islands — and still failed to get approval.
As logical as the concept of air taxis may sound, the long and winding approval process — involving everyone from air traffic controllers to environmental agencies monitoring coastal waters for future landing sites — makes it a tough sell.
And then there’s the matter of safety. It’s no coincidence that Boeing and Airbus spend decades certifying new aircraft models. So as much as we’d love to believe otherwise, I suspect we’ll still be building roads for quite some time.
