Archer Aviation plans to establish a network of five vertiports around the San Francisco Bay Area, where the company could begin flying passengers on its Midnight eVTOL air taxi as early as 2025.
Announcing the news on June 20, Archer said it is collaborating with a real estate developer to potentially establish a main hub at Oyster Point in South San Francisco. Four additional vertiport locations could open in Napa, San Jose, Oakland, and Livermore, where Archer says it has “existing relationships with infrastructure and operations partners.”
Kilroy Realty Corporation, a real estate investment trust that specializes in premium office buildings, signed a memorandum of understanding with Archer to evaluate the potential for a hub at Oyster Point, a mixed-use waterfront development it owns just a few miles north of San Francisco International Airport.
The 50-acre campus Kilroy is constructing at Oyster Point is expected to become a biotech hub with offices, laboratories, storefronts, and a park. Oyster Point is located on top of a capped landfill that closed in the 1980s and has since been cleaned up and redeveloped with a ferry terminal that opened in 2012.
Archer and Kilroy envision a multimodal mobility hub at Oyster Park, with electric ferries and air taxis alike operating on renewable energy. This waterfront mobility hub, which Archer calls the “Sea Portal,” would primarily serve employees commuting to and from the business park.
“We are excited to work with Archer to explore opportunities to add eVTOL service to Kilroy Oyster Point,” said Kilroy CEO Angela Aman. “We believe that this innovative and sustainable service has the potential to provide exceptional convenience and optionality to current and future tenants at the project, further differentiating Kilroy Oyster Point within the South San Francisco market.”
According to Archer, trips around the Bay Area that normally take up to two hours by car will only take 10 to 20 minutes in an electric air taxi. The company is working to certify the four-passenger Midnight aircraft with the FAA in time to launch commercial operations in the U.S. before the end of 2025.