This invention relates to air transportation of passengers and cargo, and more specifically, it pertains to a novel, efficient, and integrated system and method for transporting passengers and cargo by air between airports, and points of origin and destination on the ground.
Commercial air travel is riddled with inefficiencies, delays, escalating costs, and safety and security concerns. Airline bankruptcies are at an all time high and air traveler satisfaction is at an all time low. Air terminal and runway bottlenecks coupled with traffic congestion are overwhelming air carriers and airports worldwide. One of the major challenges facing the industry is the finite number and limited capacity of airports in and around major metropolitan areas where most air travel originates and terminates. In the midst of urban sprawl, airports require thousands of acres of contiguous land for runways, taxiways, concourses and gates. They also need easy access to ground transportation. As airports move further from major population centers, travel to and from the airport takes longer and increases the cost and duration of the overall trip. Increasingly, traffic congestion outside the airport and long lines for check-in and security inside the airport combined with chronic flight delays make air travel an undesirable form of transportation.
Air carriers face a number of major issues including: excessive airplane idle time during turnaround at the gate, time and safety concerns related to taxiing to and from the gate, complicated logistics of loading and unloading high capacity airplanes, passenger and cargo security, lost and damaged baggage and costly baggage handling systems, and wide variations and often dichotomous demands for passenger and cargo transportation. Additionally, tragic terrorist events in recent years have revealed that current security measures are woefully inadequate and the industry is quite vulnerable to future terrorist attacks.
The commercial air transportation industry is very inflexible in sharing resources. It has limited capability to support military air transportation needs. In the event of war or national emergencies, the industry is ill equipped to quickly convert its fleet of passenger airplanes to transport large numbers of personnel and materiel by air. As a result, the military builds up separate capacity to meet its sporadic emergency air transportation needs.
Worldwide demand for transportation of passengers and cargo by air is growing exponentially thus compounding the problems and challenges facing the industry. As demand for affordable air transportation escalates, population growth coupled with increases in tourism, business travel, and global trade further stretch the over-extended system. Currently, commercial air carriers operate approximately 15,000 passenger jets and carry over 1.8 billion passengers each year. By 2020, the number of commercial passenger jets worldwide is projected to exceed 33,000, and the number of passengers is expected to more than double.
The design and functionality of airplanes in its present format has reached a plateau. The number of manufacturers of commercial jets has dwindled to two, namely Boeing and Airbus. During the past three decades the industry has made only minor advancements. Airplane innovations in recent years include only incremental gains in operating efficiency due to the use of lighter materials and more fuel-efficient engines. Speed and passenger capacity have reached a practicable limit. Boeing's largest airplane, the 747, was introduced in 1970. It carries 400 to 525 passengers depending on the mix of economy and premium-class seats. Boeing's new 7E7 Dreamliner will carry 200 to 300 passengers and offers 15%-20% greater fuel efficiency over older models. Airbus' new A380 will carry 550 to 800 passengers depending on the model. But in order to accommodate the A380, each airport will have to spend over a billion dollars to modify runways, taxiways, concourses and gates.
The air transportation industry is in dire need of a revolutionary approach to help it eliminate current problems, lower the overall cost of operations, improve safety and security, and meet future demands.
Since the invention of the airplane a century ago, countless designs addressing various aspects of air transportation have been developed. During the past thirty years despite the crowded prior art, very little has changed in the system and method for passenger and cargo transportation by air between airports, and points of origin and destination on the ground. Although known methods and apparatus of prior art fulfill their respective goals and objectives, they do not present a novel and efficient solution for integrating air and ground transportation of passengers and cargo.
It is known in the prior art to insert passenger or cargo pods into the hollow fuselage of airplanes or to attach said pods to airframes and fly said airplanes from a departure airport to a destination airport. The following typifies the closest known prior art as it relates to the present invention.
As early as 1945, airplane design pioneers envisioned airplanes having one or more removable cargo compartments or sections. U.S. Pat. No. 2,388,380, Bathurst, et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 2,697,569, Westcott, describe an airplane skeleton frame in which the fuselage is formed of removable sections.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,379,533, Caldwell, et al. disclose a transport airplane consisting of a basic structure containing the cockpit, wings, engines, empennage, and an open, flat section connecting the cockpit and empennage portions. The payload forms the fuselage shape and may be comprised of a passenger pod, cargo container, or vehicular equipment.
In U.S. Pat. No. 6,102,332, Hexton, et al. envision a method of transporting large numbers of passengers by air from a departure airfield to a destination airfield by attaching a plurality of cylindrical passenger pods to the underside of a large flying-wing airframe.
Another example of a passenger airplane container system is given in Meyer, U.S. Pat. No. 6,494,404, which describes allowing a passenger airplane to be loaded and unloaded in a safe and efficient manner. In the very broadest sense, Meyer envisions a stacking structure with a plurality of horizontal or vertical loading chutes to raise and lower a cylindrical passenger pod between the horizontal bays and the airplane parking zone. Loading passengers into a container within the stacking structure, transporting the container down a chute and loading it into the airplane addresses the current issue of parking an airplane at the gate for extended periods. However, it creates additional handling issues within the stacking structure without addressing transportation between the airport and points of origin and destination on the ground.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,218,034, Magill envisions an airport complex comprising a multi-level passenger terminal and a cargo building in close proximity. They are interconnected by a towline cargo-handling system cooperating with a series of power-driven cargo conveyors.
While the aforementioned patents fulfill their respective, particular goals and expectations, taken either singly or in combination they are not seen to describe a system and method that integrates air and ground transportation of universal containers carrying passengers and cargo efficiently and safely by air between airports, and points of origin and destination on the ground. Thus, the system and method for integrating air and ground transportation of universal containers carrying passengers and cargo as disclosed by the present invention substantially differs from the prior art.
Airport congestion, escalating operating costs, operating inefficiencies, and safety and security issues, coupled with rising demand for air transportation have created the need for a new and improved system and method that integrates air and ground transportation of passengers and cargo. The present invention substantially addresses these issues and fulfills this need.
It is a principal object of the present invention to provide a system and method for integrating the transportation of passenger and cargo containers by air between airports, and points of origin and destination on the ground. Accordingly, the object is to improve efficiency, lower overall cost, reduce transit time from the point of origin to the destination, and enhance safety and security.
It is another object of this invention to provide an efficient and universal system and method for transporting passenger and cargo containers on streets and highways from remotely located air terminals and other points of origin to the airport, and from the airport to remote air terminals and other destinations.
It is an additional object of this invention to provide a universal container system for transporting passengers by airplane, truck, and rail, and additionally to simplify and streamline the cleaning and servicing of passenger cabins and the handling and processing of passenger baggage during the turnaround period between unloading and loading passengers, and to reduce the workload of flight attendants by providing an automated system for delivering and retrieving food trays and beverages to and from passengers.
It is also an object of this invention to provide a universal container system for transporting cargo by airplane, truck, and rail, and to improve efficiency by enabling shippers to load their cargo at the point of origin and recipients to unload their cargo at the destination.
It is a further object of this invention to provide an airplane with a hollow fuselage, and the capacity and flexibility to transport a plurality of removable universal passenger and/or cargo containers in its fuselage from a departure airport to a destination airport.
It is another object of this invention to provide an efficient system and method for rapidly and safely loading and unloading universal passenger and cargo containers into and out of transport airplanes, minimizing airplane turnaround time.
It is also an object of this invention to provide a system and method for an efficient airport with a plurality of passenger air terminals, take-off and landing runways, and flexible staging areas to load and unload passenger and cargo containers into and out of transport airplanes.
It is a further object of this invention to provide a system and method for a plurality of remote passenger air terminals, strategically located outside the airport throughout adjoining metropolitan area(s) for convenient access by travelers.
It is an additional object of this invention to increase the capacity of conventional airports by providing a system and method for processing passenger containers instead of passenger jets at the gates of air terminals, thus requiring substantially less space for maneuvering and parking at the gates.
It is another object of this invention to improve security by scanning containers for weapons including explosives and radiological and bio-chemical agents, and by restricting access from the passenger containers to the cockpit, and further by ensuring that passenger baggage travels in the same container with its owner, and to improve passenger safety by providing a parachute system for containers to safely descend to the ground in case of a mid-air mishap.
It is a further object of this invention to improve safety and efficiency and reduce fuel consumption by eliminating the need for airplanes to taxi to and from terminal gates, and for aircraft tugs to transport airplanes.
It is an additional object of this invention to provide significant and suitable air transportation capacity for transporting military personnel and materiel in the event of war or national emergency, and to enable airplanes to transport fluids for fighting forest fires, refueling military aircraft in mid-air, and other applications.
Still further objects and advantages of this invention will become apparent from a consideration of the ensuing description and drawings.