Integration of VTOL Air-taxis into an Existing Infrastructure with the Use of the Model-Based System Engineering (MBSE) Concept CUBE

One major problem of big cities is the congested traffic situation and the noise pollution generated by the traffic participants, i.e., cars, busses, and trams. Those ground-bound transport systems are already reaching their limits. The use of aerial taxi services has the potential to use the third, vertical dimension. Vertical take-off and landing systems, shortened to VTOL systems, possibly autonomous and electrified, with low noise emission and little ground space requirements are preferred. Applying an MBSE-based approach like our methodology called 'Compositional Unified system-Based Engineering', in short CUBE, enables to control the complexity of the challenge to develop appropriate VTOLs. This methodology has already proven itself in the automotive industry and its system development processes. In this paper the CUBE methodology will be transferred to the aerospace system development process to demonstrate its general usability. The fully systematical and model-based description of the System of Systems (SoS, meaning urban infrastructure here) is used to condense the requirements for the System of Interest (SoI, meaning VTOL) regarding many possibilities and limitations. This concept is a promising approach to create system-based and model-based specifications of requirements for the VTOL systems, which later shall operate seamlessly as part of the SoS.