“He envisions people from the SF Bay Area living in the foothills of the Sierras and commuting to work in their aircraft.”
Does he envision how they are all going to qualify for pilot’s licenses?
Initially there will be a pilot on board. His vision is autonomous planes. He thinks it is a FAR easier problem to solve than land vehicles. You don’t have other idiots bent on killing you on all sides of you, you don’t have semis with four foot tall tires inches from your door, you don’t have masses of vehicles all around you.
I think he’s good at looking 10 to 20 years in the future. We see the outlines and contours of this solution today, but the bugs are still nasty (look at all the bad autonomous car snafus). He’s betting on 1) the air nav problem is a lot easier to solve, 2) tech will continue to evolve, and 3) autonomous systems will mature.