Navier / Big Think
Key Takeaways
- In this op-ed, Navier CEO Sampriti Bhattacharyya argues that autonomous hydrofoiling vessels — “flying boats” — offer a faster and more scalable path to improved urban mobility than AVs or eVTOLs.
- She believes water transit is uniquely practical because coastal cities already have the conditions needed to rapidly deploy high-speed autonomous vessels.
- Advances in autonomy, robotics, and foiling technology are converging to make water-based robotaxis not a distant vision, but an imminent and scalable reality, according to Bhattacharyya.
We have been promised a future of effortless mobility, a world of flying cars and autonomous pods whisking us through gleaming cityscapes. But as we sit in gridlocked traffic, that future feels perpetually out of reach. As we wait for new bridges and tunnels to provide moderate relief, we have been looking to the skies for a better solution when the answer has been at our feet all along: the water.
Our earliest civilizations were born on the water. Rivers and coastlines were our first highways, the lifeblood of trade, exploration, and connection. Yet over the past century, we abandoned this vast open infrastructure, paving over our landscapes as cars grew efficient. We allowed highways to replace our waterways.
Today, our world is overwhelmingly coastal: 40% of the global population lives within 62 miles (100 kilometers) of a shoreline, and 14 of the world’s 17 largest cities sit near the water. This immense concentration of people and economic activity — over 10% of humanity packed into just 2% of coastal land — has created an intractable mobility crisis on land.
In response, a handful of companies across the world are rethinking what’s possible by applying advances in manufacturing, sensing, and computing — born from autonomous cars and drones — to marine mobility. Now, a new generation of high-speed, ultra-efficient hydrofoiling vessels — “flying boats” — is poised to redefine how we move through cities, offering faster point-to-point connections and fundamentally reimagining our urban geography.
The land and sky gamble: A trillion-dollar bet on a crowded field
The modern quest to solve urban mobility has largely split into two ambitious directions: autonomous vehicles (AVs) on the ground and autonomous electric vertical takeoff and landing vehicles (eVTOLs) in the sky.
The promise of each is immense. Autonomous cars offer a vision of safer, more streamlined cities by removing the human error responsible for most accidents. For eVTOLs, or “air taxis,” autonomy is even more critical as it sidesteps the immense logistical challenge of training thousands of new pilots. Combining efficient vehicles with autonomous operation is certainly the future — but there’s still a long way to go.
In our rush to conquer the complexities of land and sky, we’ve overlooked a more elegant, immediate path.
The race to perfect the land-based AV has become one of the most expensive technological endeavors in history. The numbers are staggering: the global AV market is projected to explode from around $273 billion in 2025 to an astonishing $4.45 trillion by 2034, and ARK Invest projects that autonomous taxis alone could add $26 trillion to global GDP by 2030. This gold rush has attracted immense capital, with some estimates putting collective investment near $600 billion. Yet this massive bet faces monumental hurdles. Land-based AVs must navigate the near-infinite complexity of city streets, contending with unpredictable pedestrians, cyclists, and human drivers. The regulatory landscape remains a fragmented patchwork of state laws and voluntary federal guidelines, creating a compliance nightmare for companies trying to scale.
The dream of an air-based commute faces even steeper hurdles. Despite billions in investment and countless predictions that we are just a year or two from jetting over traffic, we have yet to see a single eVTOL startup move beyond the testing stages. The technological challenges of creating safe, quiet, and long-range vehicles with current battery technology are immense. Even if those are cleared, regulatory approval remains a monumental obstacle. The FAA is still in the early stages of developing certification frameworks, while the challenges of public acceptance, noise pollution, and integrating thousands of new aircraft into already crowded urban airspace present years of additional delays.
While these moonshots are vital, they are not the whole picture. In our rush to conquer the complexities of land and sky, we’ve overlooked a more elegant, immediate path that’s been there all along.
The technological leap: Why water transit’s time is now
For decades, water transit has been limited by three persistent problems: it was too costly, too slow, and too uncomfortable. Traditional ferries — heavy, gas-burning displacement boats — waste enormous energy pushing water aside, creating disruptive wakes, and offer a rough, unreliable ride in anything but the calmest conditions.
The game-changer is the electric hydrofoil. These carbon-fiber wings lift the hull of a boat entirely above the water’s surface, eliminating most hydrodynamic drag. This cuts energy use by nearly 80% compared to conventional vessels. Paired with advances in batteries, sensors, and lightweight composites, high-speed electric water transit is finally technically and economically viable.
Autonomous robotaxis on the water are not a distant dream, but the logical and inevitable next step toward unlocking fast, clean mobility for America’s coasts.
While Europe has pushed modern water transit forward, with companies like Candela making some progress on hydrofoiling vessels, its focus has largely been on building an efficient vessel. In the United States, the opportunity looks fundamentally different. The real unlock isn’t just designing a better boat; it’s building the entire full-stack ecosystem required to deploy autonomous water mobility at scale.
That means vessels, yes — but also the autonomy stack, sensing systems, flight-control software, and eventually the robotic shipyards capable of producing these vehicles with the precision and repeatability needed for true urban fleets. America’s strength has always been in building integrated systems, not standalone products, and water mobility is no exception. This approach is what will enable the shift from electric foiling boats to autonomous marine robotaxis operating reliably in major coastal cities like San Francisco, New York, and Miami.
My company, Navier, is building at the forefront of this movement. Our flagship vessel, the Navier 30 (N30), uses aerospace-grade flight control to actively stabilize the craft hundreds of times per second, delivering a smooth, seasickness-free ride with zero emissions and virtually no noise. It is 10 times more efficient than traditional gas boats, not because it’s a better boat, but because it behaves more like a marine aircraft.
From the start, our vision has been to solve the two fundamental barriers of maritime transit: energy and labor. While our hydrofoil technology solves the energy equation, autonomy is the critical answer to the labor half. It addresses more than just cost. It solves the practical bottleneck of a growing captain shortage that stands in the way of a truly scalable network. Seen through this lens, autonomous robotaxis on the water are not a distant dream, but the logical and inevitable next step toward unlocking fast, clean mobility for America’s coasts.
Why water is a simpler, faster path to autonomy
The decisive advantage of this blue frontier is the speed at which we can achieve full autonomy because navigating water is fundamentally simpler than navigating land or air.
A simpler operating environment: Unlike a chaotic city street, the open water has no intersections, pedestrians, or cyclists. An autonomous vessel doesn’t need to distinguish a plastic bag from a child. It operates in a structured world where the number of variables is orders of magnitude lower. Given that human error causes an estimated 75% of maritime accidents, automation in this simpler domain offers a clear and direct path to enhanced safety.
A clearer regulatory path: This speed is amplified by a streamlined and mature regulatory landscape. Instead of a fractured patchwork of state and city laws, maritime autonomy in the U.S. is governed by a single, pragmatic body: the United States Coast Guard. This isn’t new territory for the USCG, which has years of experience overseeing autonomous vessels from companies like Saildrone. It is an experienced regulator adapting existing principles, not a fearful one reacting to a new technology. The USCG also aligns with the coherent framework of the International Maritime Organization (IMO), whose clear roadmap for autonomous ships — the Maritime Autonomous Surface Ships (MASS) code — provides the long-term predictability that land AVs lack. Finally, water-based autonomy gets a powerful tailwind from its land-based counterparts. As AVs normalize autonomous travel, the hard work of winning public trust is already being done, lowering the psychological barrier for accepting a robotaxi on the water.
No new infrastructure needed: A third profound advantage is the lack of new infrastructure required. While eVTOLs need vertiports and AVs need costly road upgrades, high-speed water transit leverages a vast network that is already built and powered. America’s thousands of marinas and docks are not just boat slips; they are a latent transportation network ready to be activated, connecting communities without a single shovel breaking ground. Crucially, this network is already electrified. Marinas are equipped with the shore power needed for charging, eliminating the need for new stations or grid upgrades. This bring-your-own-infrastructure model allows for network deployment at a fraction of the cost and time, lighting up new routes almost overnight.
A new ecosystem of mobility
This technology will do more than revitalize aging ferries. It will unlock an entirely new ecosystem of integrated water mobility, starting with the most valuable and congested corridors.
The sustainable hospitality beachhead: In this initial phase, before the technology reaches the mass market, the revolution is beginning at the top. Much like the dawn of the aviation or automotive industries, the proof points for high-speed electric water transit are emerging in luxury hospitality and premium “water limo” services.
For destinations built around water, the journey is the destination. Yet, in pristine locations like the Maldives, Bora Bora, or the Caribbean, resorts that market sustainability often rely on loud, gas-guzzling diesel boats to ferry guests. It is a jarring disconnect: a carbon-heavy arrival to an eco-conscious paradise. Electric hydrofoils close this gap, offering the quiet, zero-emission journey that aligns a brand’s promise with the guest experience, ensuring the arrival enhances, rather than undermines, the destination.
This need is equally pressing in American summer enclaves like Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard, and Cape Cod. As tourism swells and travelers increasingly seek alternatives to regional helicopter flights, high-speed, comfortable boats are becoming essential infrastructure, not just recreation.
A Navier N30 operating for Four Seasons, Lake Austin. Credit: Navier
The standardization opportunity: The business opportunity here goes beyond just building better boats; it is about organizing a chaotic market. On land, we have achieved standardized, reliable experiences, whether staying at a Four Seasons or a Holiday Inn, riding in an Uber Black or an Uber X. In the air, for example, we trust the consistency of NetJets or Southwest.
But on the water? The global network is non-existent. It remains a fragmented, localized Wild West of operators with varying standards of safety and comfort. This is the promise of the new Blue Highway: to establish a unified, reliable global network. The impact of standardizing water transit will be as transformative for coastal mobility as railways were for land and airlines were for the sky.
Scaling in coastal cities: As this network scales, the focus will shift from premium leisure to the high-frequency arteries of our coastal megacities — first in the form of high-speed corporate shuttles and water taxis, and eventually as the backbone of public transit. In America’s two most vital economic engines, San Francisco and New York, the math is already undeniable.
Left: Examples of routes in the Bay Area: every marina can be a transportation hub. Right: Lounges, much like in airports, will be seen in marinas with a high density of travelers. Credit: Navier
In the Bay Area, water transit offers a direct antidote to the gridlock on bridges and freeways, turning hours of lost productivity into minutes of smooth transit.
- The airport super-connector: Trips to the airport are a multibillion-dollar market, with over 120 million annual ride-hail trips in the U.S. alone. Geographically, these routes are a perfect match for water transit — many major airports, including JFK, SFO, and Miami International, sit on congested coastlines. In the Bay Area, consider the route from Sausalito to SFO. In heavy traffic, this drive can easily take 1.5 hours. A foiling water taxi can cover that distance in just 30 minutes. Even factoring in the time it’d take you to travel to the dock, it’d significantly reduce your travel time.
- The biotech link: The commute from residential Alameda to the biotech hubs at Oyster Point is a grind on land. On a hydrofoil cruising at 25 knots, that transit time drops to just 13 minutes. This suddenly makes the East Bay accessible to Peninsula employers, radically expanding their talent pool. A serene 15-minute hydrofoil ride is a more compelling perk than a parking spot and radically expands a company’s commuter catchment area without adding cars to congested bridges
- The cross-bay commute: Routes like Redwood City to Berkeley, which force drivers through the worst of the I-880 corridor, can see travel times halved by simply cutting a straight line across the Bay.
Credit: Navier
In New York City, the geography is defined by choke points — tunnels and bridges that paralyze the city twice a day. A 30-knot vessel doesn’t just move faster; it makes these obstacles irrelevant.
- The tunnel bypass: Driving from Jersey City to Midtown Manhattan during rush hour forces commuters into the Lincoln Tunnel, where a 4-mile trip can take 60 minutes or more. A foiling taxi makes that crossing in under 10 minutes.
- The bridge bypass: For residents in Williamsburg trying to reach Wall Street, the Williamsburg Bridge and FDR Drive are chronic parking lots, often pushing drive times to 45 minutes. On the water, that trip is a straight shot down the East River taking less than 10 minutes.
- The airport connection: A rush-hour drive from Lower Manhattan to JFK is a gamble that often exceeds 90 minutes. A high-speed water route on a foiling vessel could reach the bay near the airport in roughly 35 minutes, offering the only traffic-free guarantee in the city.
The economic engine: Why scale is inevitable
Crucially, this model is compelling long before full autonomy is realized. A manned electric hydrofoil service is already profitable in these premium corridors due to its massive fuel and maintenance savings. Underpinning this revolution is a radical shift in unit economics that makes water transit not just cleaner, but drastically cheaper. A traditional 30-foot gas boat burns cash as fast as it burns fuel, costing roughly $4 to $5 per nautical mile to operate. An electric hydrofoil changes the equation entirely, dropping that cost to just $0.30 per nautical mile.
This staggering 10x reduction is driven by the physics of foiling (which requires far less energy) combined with the low cost of electricity versus gasoline and the near-zero maintenance of electric drivetrains.
The impact of this technology extends beyond moving people.
The journey begins with a premium, manned service that is seamlessly integrated into the fabric of urban life through the same ride-sharing apps used to summon a car. But scaling a high-frequency network in a dense city will introduce a new bottleneck: labor. As we move from operating a few premium shuttles to deploying fleets of hundreds of water taxis in a large number of cities, finding enough qualified captains becomes impossible. This is when autonomy becomes inevitable. It is the only way to break the labor constraint, allowing us to run safe, high-frequency, 24/7 networks that can truly compete with land-based transit while also reducing labor costs, which is about $35 per hour for a US Coast Guard certified captain.
Finally, as robotic manufacturing and advances in battery technology — and therefore cheaper electric powertrains — drive costs down, this premium experience will democratize into an everyday utility. The endgame extends beyond small craft. The same principles of foiling and, eventually, autonomy will transform the core economics of larger public ferries, reshaping coastal transportation from the top down.
The next wave: Revolutionizing urban logistics
The impact of this technology extends beyond moving people. The same principles of electric, autonomous navigation will revolutionize urban logistics. Autonomous electric cargo barges represent a massive opportunity to move goods more cleanly and efficiently, taking thousands of trucks off our congested city streets.
The market is already emerging, with projections showing the autonomous barge sector growing to $1.3 billion by 2029. These silent, zero-emission vessels can operate 24/7, shuttling goods between major ports and inland distribution centers via our waterways. This modal shift will not only slash emissions and reduce road maintenance costs but also create more resilient and efficient supply chains. Once again, the regulatory path is clearer, and the operational environment is far simpler than deploying autonomous trucks in dense urban cores.
Waterways are the “blue highways” of tomorrow
The most extraordinary asset for our coastal cities is the one we have spent a century ignoring: the water itself. We have long treated it as a barrier to overcome, even as our cities grew more congested and housing was pushed ever farther from opportunity. This new generation of water transit can reverse that trend, collapsing commute times, unlocking new economic corridors, and reconnecting communities without the immense cost and consequence of new land-based infrastructure.
This is not a distant vision. The convergence of electric hydrofoils, autonomy, and robotics is happening at a pace unthinkable even a decade ago. And America, as the global leader in software, autonomy, and advanced manufacturing, is uniquely positioned to spearhead this transformation. If the 20th century was defined by the highway, the 21st will be defined by the cities that reclaim their waterways. They are not relics of our past. They are the highways of our future.
Tags aicitiesEmerging Techopinion In this article aicitiesEmerging Techopinion Sign up for Big Think on Substack The most surprising and impactful new stories delivered to your inbox every week, for free. Subscribe
