Exploring Social Acceptance in Urban Air Mobility: Insights from Anna Palaiologk

Anna Palaiologk, is a research consultant and transport economist at Future Needs.

In this interview, Anna explains her role in ImAFUSA: Future Needs has been involved in the project from its inception, having been instrumental in developing the original project proposal and consortium. This forms part of a longer term research roadmap focused on measuring the societal and environmental impacts of Urban Air Mobility (UAM).

Anna says, “With this new transportation mode coming up I think it is … important to already plan ahead the future and try to frame it, regulate it in the way that is most beneficial for society so that both the economy can benefit, the stakeholders on the supplier side can benefit … but also citizens can receive the least negative impacts and the most benefits.”

In addition to research on socio-economic indicators to assess the impact of UAM and helping to design and run experiments in the field on noise pollution from drones, Future Needs also leads the ImAFUSA Project’s Communication and Dissemination activities. The team’s expertise in science communication is helping maximise the project’s impact by ensuring its outcomes reach a wide range of stakeholders, including policymakers, technology providers, and citizens.

Watch the full interview above to learn more about the research that will help shape the future of urban air mobility.

Since this interview was recorded, Anna’s work resulted in the paper “ Integrating Urban Air Mobility into Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans: A Framework and Occupational Profiles for Smart Cities,” co-authored with Thanos Arvanitidis, which was presented at the TSAS 2025 conference.

You can read more about the paper here.