Low-altitude sky-lane map: a new infrastructure of the high-density flying safety for low-altitude economy

The low-altitude airspace, as the layer nearest to the ground, constitutes the space essential for human survival. Developing and utilizing low-altitude airspace is essential for humanity to broaden cognitive horizons and expand survival space. Furthermore, it has positioned itself at the forefront of global technology, the core of future economic competition, and a major national strategic priority. The precondition and foundation of a low-altitude economy is large-scale flight. However, unlike ground transportation with clearly defined roads, current low-altitude flight operates without established pathways, rendering the safety of large-scale urban low-altitude flights one of the most intricate and pressing global challenges. Urban-level flights at the scale of millions confront the essential safety challenge of determining “where to fly and how to fly”. To address this challenge, this study introduces the low-altitude sky-lane mapping, clarifies its definition and scope, and establishes a three-dimensional, dynamic, spatiotemporally dense low-altitude public infrastructure with risk-topology representation. The low-altitude sky-lane map is defined as a thematic map that systematically represents ground risks, flyable zones, sky-lane components, flight regulations, topological relationships, and dynamic variations. It constitutes a novel type of digital public infrastructure specifically designed for urban-scale low-altitude flight operations. Its primary objective is to generate orderly, safe, and navigable low-altitude sky-lanes from complex, heterogeneous, and highly dynamic surface environments, thereby establishing a dynamic, three-dimensional, spatiotemporally dense, topologically connected, and human-and machine-readable thematic map framework. The essence of a low-altitude sky-lane map is to capture how low-altitude flights potentially affect land use and human activities on the ground, and how these effects are projected and mapped in the low-altitude airspace. It functions as a generalized representation integrating flight regulations, operational safety requirements, and spatial organization principles. Additionally, the low-altitude sky-lane map provides a digital representation of the “ground risk–low-altitude topology,” characterized by dynamic three-dimensionality and high spatiotemporal density. In contrast to the 2D structure of terrestrial road maps and the hierarchical airway charts of high-altitude civil aviation, low-altitude sky-lane maps possess a clear three-dimensional framework with flight regulations, enabling aircraft to independently choose altitude and navigation paths within the vertical dimension. The map can be updated and reconfigured in real time according to dynamic ground risks, offering aircraft reliable navigational guidance. From a technical perspective, the study elaborates on a dynamic and static, multi-factor, multi-dimensional, multi-level risk computation and flyable-space modeling method for low-altitude flight zones, achieving accurate risk quantification in urban areas with dense buildings, highly mixed land use, concentrated populations, and highly dynamic activities. The study establishes a systematic framework of low-altitude sky-lane elements, flight traffic regulations, sky-lane topology, and automated sky-lane generation models, thereby enabling the generation of urban low-altitude sky-lane components, including takeoff and landing points, flight corridors, flyable surfaces, and restricted zones. Moreover, The study summarizes human-and machine-readable low-altitude sky-lane map representations and dynamic updating methods, enabling human-readable map visualization, machine-readable map structuring, human-machine adaptation, and dynamic updates of map elements. In summary, this work advances the state of the art in low-altitude risk computation, regulatory modeling, and human-machine map representation, providing a high-precision framework for constructing low-altitude sky-lane maps structured as “flyability modeling—sky-lane generation—human-machine mapping”. Finally, the Wuhan city-level low-altitude sky-lane map was developed, and the “SkyRoute” platform was implemented, demonstrating the possibility of supporting million-level orderly low-altitude flights with safety assurance, and is expected to serve as a key to addressing the safety-era challenges of the low-altitude economy.