Transportation

1966-67 AAA map of New York

Maps of the Future

A 1989 prediction about portable GPS devices was right on the money

Lean-On-Me Tray with hot entree

A More Efficient Airline Meal Tray

A recent innovation in the design of the airline meal tray has resulted in massive savings. Maybe the next innovation should focus on the actual food

Flying ambulance of the future (1927)

The Flying Ambulance of Tomorrow

In the 1920s, a French inventor devised an ingenious way to provide emergency medical assistance

The solar powered house of the future from 1959

The World Will Be Wonderful In The Year 2000!

The secret formula for predicting a fantastical yet credible future

Fourth-grader Lisa Gilvar's Jetsons-inspired bubble-top homes

1970s Children Draw Robot Presidents and Nuclear Apocalypse

Kids predict the darndest things

Will personal rapid transit -- or "pods" -- ever come to the United States?

Is the U.S. Out of Love with Cutting-Edge Transit?

It feels like it. But there is plenty of innovative thinking shaping the future of public transportation. You just need to look elsewhere to find it

Jetpack pilot at Super Bowl I in 1967

The Super Bowl’s Love Affair With Jetpacks

Thankfully, this Super Bowl spectacle never had a wardrobe malfunction

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Sunday Funnies Blast Off Into the Space Age

When Dr. Athelstan Spilhaus met President Kennedy in 1962, JFK told him, "The only science I ever learned was from your comic strip."

Illustration for the February, 1946 issue of the sci-fi magazine Amazing Stories

Trade Your Trouble for a Bubble

Sightseeing across the country in an atomic-powered "pleasure ball"

The New York subway system's moving sidewalk of the future by Goodyear (1950s)

Moving Sidewalks Before The Jetsons

The public's fascination with the concept of "movable pavement" extends back more than 130 years

Everyday Science and Mechanics (February, 1936)

Mobsters Tremble Before the Crime-Fighting, Red Flying Gondola

Science-fiction pioneer Hugo Gernsback predicted that, as long as police officers were stuck on terra firma, criminals always would have the edge

Flying machine of the year 2012

The Fanciful, Chocolate-Filled World of 2012

In 1912, the French chocolate company Lombart printed a series of six collectible cards envisioning daily life one hundred years in the future

"Highways by Automation" by Arthur Radebuagh

Giant Automatic Highway Builders of the Future

Radebaugh's vision of a road-creating machine may not have been a figment of just his imagination- a Disney-produced television program had a similar idea

Zipping from San Francisco to Oakland in 5 Minutes

An inventor's plans for traveling inside a giant bullet would have made a trip across the Bay a fast one

Arthur Radebaugh's jetpack mailman of the future

Arthur Radebaugh’s Shiny Happy Future

For five years, a popular comic strip gave us a preview of life in Suburbatopia

J.W. Fawkes's "Aerial Swallow" circa 1912

Burbank’s Aerial Monorail of the Future

A bold vision for a propeller-driven train never quite got off the ground

"Car of the future" sketch from Ford

1955 Imagines Travel in 1965

The Ford Motor Company envisioned a Batmobile in every garage.

Thomas Edison circa 1914

Thomas Edison’s Brief Stint As A Homemaker

The famous inventor envisioned a future of inexpensive, prefabricated concrete homes

"Airships may give us a birds eye view of the city."

The Boston Globe of 1900 Imagines the Year 2000

A utopian vision of Boston promises no slums, no traffic jams, no late mail deliveries and, best of all, night baseball games

A circular landing track imagined for New York in 1919

When We All Commute by Airplane

If commuting to work via personal aeroplane was the future, how might the design of cities change to accommodate them?

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