Flying High - Phase 2

Flying High Phase 2
Abstract and Public Summary for IUK

Nesta’s Flying High is the first programme of its kind to convene city leaders, regulators, public services, central government and industry around the future of drones in cities. Flying High seeks to position the UK to become a global leader in shaping drone systems that place people’s needs first.
In the first phase of Flying High, Nesta engaged five UK cities over six months in 2018 to explore the potential uses of drones/aerial robotics in urban environments, capture public sentiment, propose guidelines on drone use in the public realm and analyse the technical and economic feasibility of five socially beneficial use cases in real-world scenarios - transporting medical supplies among hospitals, responding to emergencies and supporting infrastructure development.
Flying High Phase 2 builds on the findings from Phase 1 by designing the testing capabilities and challenge prize specifications for socially beneficial, city-based use cases in the categories of medical transport, emergency response and infrastructure maintenance. Nesta will map urban drone use scenarios based on unique place-based circumstances and regulatory conditions relevant to UK cities; and design and specify the infrastructure requirements for virtual and physical testbed environments for integrated drone services in a complex city environment, based on city demand and CAA requirements. These activities will inform design of an innovation challenge to accelerate development of urban drone services that bring public benefit to UK cities. The project will bring together city stakeholders with national policymakers and regulators, industry, service users and the public to design testing scenarios.
Flying High Phase 2 will create the necessary groundwork to launch the innovation challenge and accelerator programme in Phase 3, anticipated to take place over two years beginning Summer 2019. The innovation challenge will consist of a series of stage-gate, outcome-based funding opportunities to prove the viability of real-world urban drone applications. Industry will have the opportunity to develop and prove place-based drone use cases demonstrating technological capabilities based on a viable business case in a UK city. Teams will be required to demonstrate safe, reliable integration of these services in urban airspace, with a particular focus on issues related to extreme environments, like operation in complex airspace near to buildings, safely and seamlessly with other traffic/airspace users, with beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) operations. The innovation challenge will offer competitive, outcome-based funding; specialised controlled testing environments and public trials; and a collaborative platform to enable technology design, business case development, public engagement and regulatory evolution.