Jim McMahon

Now here’s a way to beat traffic: The AirCar is a two-passenger sports car that can drive on the road and fly like a plane, thanks to convertible wings that unfold with the click of a button. The prototype, which can fly as high as 8,200 feet and as fast as 118 miles an hour, recently completed a 35-minute test flight between two airports in Slovakia, where it was constructed. (Like traditional airplanes, the vehicle requires a runway to take off and land.) Klein Vision, the company that developed the AirCar, says the craft will cut down on travel time and simplify trips between cities because drivers won’t have to find another source of transportation to reach their final destinations. Globally, dozens of other flying vehicles are in the works and could be available in the next few years, although not all of them will double as cars. It might not all be smooth sailing: Rules for air traffic and safety will need to be developed, and costs may be prohibitive, as the craft are expected to cost hundreds of thousands of dollars each. Still, Klein Vision is celebrating this step in the process. “This flight starts a new era of dual transportation vehicles,” says AirCar inventor Stefan Klein. “It has turned science fiction into a reality.”