That 1999 article claiming we'd all have flying cars by 2015 still cracks me up

I was cleaning out my dad's old desk last weekend and found a clipped out newspaper piece from like 1999 that said by 2015 we'd all be zipping around in flying cars. The guy was so sure traffic jams would be a thing of the past. Here I am in 2024 stuck in a 45 minute backup on I-5 because someone's sedan overheated. I mean it's funny how those predictions always skip the boring stuff like how we'd build landing pads or regulate air traffic. We can barely get people to use turn signals on the ground. I bet in another 20 years they'll still be saying flying cars are "just around the corner." Has anyone else found old predictions that aged this badly?

2 comments

2 Comments

james6721mo ago

You know I used to actually believe that stuff. I remember being a teenager in the early 2000s and thinking by the time I was 40 I'd be commuting in a little hover car like from The Jetsons. But your post about landing pads and air traffic regulation really hit me. I never once stopped to think about how we'd actually make it work in real life. It is pretty funny how the future always sounds better in the prediction than it ever turns out in reality.

margaretf401mo ago

You know what really gets me about all this future tech talk is nobody ever mentions the noise pollution angle. I live near a major city and honestly the idea of hundreds of those things buzzing overhead every morning and evening makes my head hurt. Plus hover cars would kick up so much dust and debris from the ground that everyone walking around would be covered in dirt all the time. The Jetsons never showed anyone having to sweep their patio every single day because of all the landing and takeoff. And real talk what happens when a hover car breaks down mid commute and just hangs there blocking everything underneath it. Nobody ever plans for the boring annoying parts of new technology.