Cargo drones and aero taxis, Ancona bids to host a vertiport

The Marches region is also entering the era of Urban Air Mobility (UAM), and Ancona is one of the Italian cities that are candidates to be equipped with a vertiport, the infrastructure intended for the take-off and vertical landing of eVTOL vehicles, both cargo drones and two-seater aero taxis equipped with electric motors, which move at a very short range (less than 50 km), at low altitude (below 1.500 metres above the ground), in urban and suburban areas, and capable of transporting goods weighing up to 250/300 kg. A system conceived to be silent, clean and safe, destined to enhance the offer of logistics services guaranteed by the port, railway station, freight village, airport and hospital, which in the capital of the Marche region are all within a radius of about ten kilometres as the crow flies, and which will be further supported by the presence in Jesi of Amazon's fifth distribution centre in central-southern Italy, which will be operational starting next year.

The project has a total value of EUR 2.5 million, of which EUR 1 million comes from private investment and EUR 1.5 million from non-repayable funds (from European PR ERDF 21-27 funds). Lu.Ce is leading the project, with headquarters in Monsano (Ancona), where the industrial laboratory is also operational, and secondary offices in Comunanza (Ascoli Piceno) and Bevagna (Perugia). The company specialises in the provision of facility management services and in 12 years of activity has become an innovative SME, offering technology for various industrial sectors, developed in-house and patented. "The idea of the vertiporto was born from discussions with the CEO of Ancona Airport, Alex D'Orsogna, and the director of Meccano, Letizia Urbani: we examined current airport services and possible future scenarios, with a focus on emergency management and the role of drones during these events," explains Luca Ceccarelli, head of strategy at Lu.Ce.

The vertiport in the Marche region will be a plug&play system, easily transportable, usable in various operational and climatic contexts, modular and self-sustainable. It will be developed in cooperation with Ancona International Airport, which is responsible for the development of operating procedures for the different contexts of use, and which will also provide personnel to test the prototype and space for the platform (another will be located at the port). Together with Lu.Ce, which will also take care of the creation of the technical management and maintenance file and the safety plan, there is a lot of innovation produced in Central Italy: Euro Stampi of Jesi will develop the tiles and loading ramps in recycled polymer material, powered by photovoltaic panels, produced by injection moulding and containing an electronic system for the autonomous management of take-off and landing operations; Selektra Italia of Pomezia (Rome) will focus on the sensor part, using its expertise in 5G networks and LoRaWan technology to ensure a fast and secure transmission network; the Marche Polytechnic University will collaborate on the development and deployment of the sensor system in the platform together with Meccano, which will take care of all the tests to ensure that the vertiport will be ready to be operational in various scenarios by December 2025.