Vertical Aerospace’s Valo Begins New York Tour This Week, As Plans for Its Electric Air Taxi Routes in City Revealed

Ver­ti­cal Aero­space launch­es its US tour in New York City this week, where it will bring its new com­mer­cial elec­tric air­craft Valo to the coun­try for the first time and reveal plans for elec­tric air taxi routes in The Big Apple with Bris­tow Group and Sky­ports Infra­struc­ture.

The tour builds on Valo’s unveil­ing in Lon­don in Decem­ber 2025 and marks the next step in Vertical’s glob­al engage­ment with cus­tomers, investors, reg­u­la­tors, and part­ners ahead of entry into ser­vice fol­low­ing reg­u­la­to­ry approval cur­rent­ly expect­ed in 2028.

Valo will be on pub­lic dis­play this Fri­day, Jan­u­ary 23rd from 9am to 5pm EST at the Clas­sic Car Club Man­hat­tan, Pier 76, 408 12th Ave. Vis­i­tors will have the oppor­tu­ni­ty to expe­ri­ence Valo at full scale and learn more about Vertical’s air­craft, tech­nol­o­gy and cer­ti­fi­ca­tion jour­ney. No tick­ets are required.  

Stu­art Simp­son, CEO of Ver­ti­cal Aero­space, said: “The US Valo tour builds on the momen­tum from our Lon­don unveil­ing and a year of strong exe­cu­tion across test­ing, part­ner­ships and cer­ti­fi­ca­tion.

“New York is a nat­ur­al next step to explore how elec­tric avi­a­tion could sup­port urban and region­al trav­el in the US, work­ing with part­ners like Bris­tow and Sky­ports to keep safe­ty, cer­ti­fi­ca­tion and real-world oper­a­tions at the core.”

Intro­duc­ing Valo to the U.S.

Valo is Vertical’s cer­ti­fi­ca­tion-ready air­craft, designed to fly up to 100 miles at speeds of up to 150 mph with zero oper­at­ing emis­sions, and engi­neered to meet air­lin­er-lev­el safe­ty stan­dards.

Valo’s pre­mi­um cab­in will launch with four seats, offer­ing panoram­ic win­dows, gen­er­ous per­son­al space and class-lead­ing lug­gage capac­i­ty.

The aircraft’s flex­i­ble design, shaped by exten­sive air­line and oper­a­tor input, enables expan­sion to six seats, with the poten­tial to improve oper­a­tor eco­nom­ics and low­er fares for pas­sen­gers. 

The air­craft is tar­get­ing cer­ti­fi­ca­tion in 2028, enabling entry into ser­vice in the U.S. and glob­al­ly with air­line and oper­a­tor cus­tomers includ­ing Amer­i­can Air­lines.

Valo’s arrival in New York marks the first oppor­tu­ni­ty for U.S. investors, cus­tomers, part­ners, and the pub­lic to expe­ri­ence the air­craft at full scale.

From Air­craft to Oper­a­tions: Elec­tric Air Trav­el in New York

Along­side the U.S. tour, Ver­ti­cal is work­ing with Bris­tow and Sky­ports on a range of future mobil­i­ty solu­tions for Valo in the U.S., includ­ing routes in and out of Man­hat­tan, New York. The plans will cut mul­ti-hour road jour­neys to min­utes, such as fly­ing from John F. Kennedy (JFK) and oth­er air­ports to Man­hat­tan.

Informed by Bristow’s glob­al oper­at­ing expe­ri­ence as the world’s lead­ing provider of heli­copter trans­porta­tion and Sky­ports’ estab­lished sky­port loca­tions, includ­ing its Down­town Sky­port in Man­hat­tan, the plans focus on oper­a­tional fea­si­bil­i­ty, infra­struc­ture inte­gra­tion, and real-world use cas­es. 

New York City rep­re­sents a nat­ur­al envi­ron­ment for advanced air mobil­i­ty giv­en its den­si­ty, con­ges­tion, pre­mi­um trav­el demand and exist­ing heli­port net­work.

Use cas­es being pro­gressed in the New York City area include:

• Air­port trans­fers: con­nec­tions between Down­town Sky­port and major region­al air­ports, sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduc­ing jour­ney times for trav­ellers, e.g., con­nect­ing JFK to Man­hat­tan in min­utes
• Event trav­el: game-day access from Down­town Sky­port to MetLife Sta­di­um, poten­tial­ly via estab­lished avi­a­tion facil­i­ties such as Teter­boro Air­port
• Aer­i­al sight­see­ing and air tours: depart­ing from Down­town Sky­port, tak­ing advan­tage of Valo’s large cab­in, panoram­ic win­dows and qui­et, zero-emis­sions oper­a­tion
• Week­end and leisure trav­el: con­nec­tions between Down­town Sky­port and East Hamp­ton Air­port, sup­port­ing pre­mi­um short-break trav­el
• Cross-town urban trans­fers: links between Down­town Sky­port and heli­ports such as West 30th Street or East 40th Street, offer­ing a qui­eter, low­er-emis­sions alter­na­tive to con­ven­tion­al heli­copters
• Emer­gency Ser­vices – med­ical trans­fers with­in New York area, e.g., Westch­ester Coun­ty Med­ical Cen­ter to New York Uni­ver­si­ty Lan­gone

This work builds on Vertical’s recent UK col­lab­o­ra­tion with Bris­tow and Sky­ports, which out­lines planned elec­tric air-taxi routes from Canary Wharf to major UK trans­port hubs, includ­ing Lon­don Heathrow Air­port, and demon­strates how elec­tric avi­a­tion will be inte­grat­ed safe­ly and prac­ti­cal­ly into exist­ing urban infra­struc­ture.

Chris Brad­shaw, Pres­i­dent and CEO of Bris­tow Group, said: “Bris­tow oper­ates com­plex avi­a­tion ser­vices all over the world, from off­shore ener­gy to gov­ern­ment and pas­sen­ger trans­port. Explor­ing future eVTOL use cas­es in a mar­ket like New York allows us to apply that oper­a­tional expe­ri­ence to new, sus­tain­able avi­a­tion con­cepts as the tech­nol­o­gy and reg­u­la­to­ry envi­ron­ment con­tin­ue to mature.”

Dun­can Walk­er, CEO of Sky­ports Infra­struc­ture, added: “Sky­ports cre­ates and oper­ates the essen­tial infra­struc­ture that will sup­port the inte­gra­tion of new eVTOL air­craft into exist­ing cities and trans­port net­works.

“Eval­u­at­ing poten­tial use cas­es around Down­town Sky­port helps demon­strate how our infra­struc­ture could sup­port a wide range of jour­neys — from air­ports and events to leisure and urban con­nec­tions — as elec­tric avi­a­tion devel­ops.”