{"id":211738,"date":"2026-04-27T21:23:35","date_gmt":"2026-04-27T21:23:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/211738\/"},"modified":"2026-04-27T21:23:35","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T21:23:35","slug":"joby-flies-electric-air-taxis-between-jfk-and-manhattan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/211738\/","title":{"rendered":"Joby Flies Electric Air Taxis Between JFK and Manhattan"},"content":{"rendered":"

A pre-production prototype eVTOL aircraft at Joby\u2019s facility in Marina, Calif. (Nic Coury\/Bloomberg)<\/p>\n

\n April 27, 2026 4:05 PM, EDT<\/p>\n

Joby Aviation is flying electric air taxis between John F. Kennedy International Airport and Manhattan this week to show off its quieter, zero-emission aircraft in a city weary of noise pollution.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The demonstration flights are New York\u2019s first point-to-point trips of an electric vertical takeoff and landing vehicle, or eVTOL, according to Joby, which staged a test flight from the downtown heliport in 2023. This week, the aircraft will fly along existing helicopter routes operated by Blade Urban Air Mobility, a division of Joby, and will have pilots but no passengers.\n \t \t\t<\/p>\n

The trips are part of a new federal\u00a0<\/a>program<\/a>\u00a0that\u2019s meant to accelerate the integration of air taxis into U.S. airspace. Joby aims to start passenger flights in New York, Texas and Florida as soon as the second half of this year, said CEO JoeBen Bevirt. But the company, which still needs the Federal Aviation Administration to certify its aircraft, has pushed back previous goals in the past.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Joby will be seeking to introduce New Yorkers to electric flights over 10 days of multiple trips. It will be flying from JFK to Blade lounges at West 30th Street at Hudson Yards and at East 34th Street, as well as the downtown heliport.\u00a0\n \t\t<\/p>\n

At an April 27 event at the lounge near Hudson Yards, dozens of invitees watched a flight, getting a close-up view of the blue and white aircraft after it landed and hearing its muted motors as it took off again.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur target for the aircraft is essentially to be equivalent over time to what Uber costs today and get people to the destination five to 10 times faster and do that at greater safety than helicopters or even driving on the ground,\u201d said Paul Sciarra, Joby\u2019s executive chairman. \u201cWe\u2019ve got an opportunity with this flight to begin to showcase that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Air taxis are \u201ca hundred times quieter\u201d than helicopters, Bevirt said. Instead of the low-frequency thumping of a helicopter that shakes buildings and annoys people, the Joby aircraft\u2019s sound is designed \u201cto be more of a whoosh, and that\u2019s a broadband noise that blends into the background and also dissipates much more quickly over distance,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"RoadSigns\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Ralph Dimenna of Aperia Technologies breaks down the latest advances in tire management technology.\u00a0Tune in above or by going to RoadSigns.ttnews.com<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Earlier this year, the Transportation Department\u00a0selected companies<\/a>\u00a0including Santa Cruz, Calif.-based Joby to participate in the pilot program, which is meant to allow cities to begin to develop infrastructure and to create familiarity among the public.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The proliferation of helicopters in tourist, charter and commuter service has caused a surge in noise complaints around New York City in recent years, reaching a peak of 59,000 calls to 311 in 2023 from 3,300 in 2019. Helicopter security has also come under increased scrutiny after a\u00a0crash last year\u00a0that killed a Siemens AG executive, his wife and three children.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Joby says its aircraft are built with greater levels of redundancy that will make them safer. They have six propellers, each driven by two electric motors that are wired to separate battery packs, and three flight computers.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMost helicopters were designed for military, oil and gas, and utility applications \u2014 not passengers,\u201d said Rob Wiesenthal, CEO of Blade. \u201cSometimes it\u2019s like watching a passenger climb into a cement mixer. When you board a Joby, it feels like stepping into a thoughtfully designed car.\u200b\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A pre-production prototype eVTOL aircraft at Joby\u2019s facility in Marina, Calif. (Nic Coury\/Bloomberg) April 27, 2026 4:05 PM,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":211739,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[83444,75,84,83,9,24,63],"class_list":{"0":"post-211738","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-manhattan","8":"tag-joby","9":"tag-manhattan","10":"tag-manhattan-headlines","11":"tag-manhattan-news","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-city","14":"tag-nyc"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211738","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=211738"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211738\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/211739"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=211738"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=211738"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=211738"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}