UAM MARKET PULSE · ISSUE 13
Friday, June 12, 2026

2,678 Heliports Changed Risk Tier This Week. Nothing on the Ground Changed.

Behind the FAA facility registry sits a second federal paper trail: the airspace case files. This week we matched all 483,006 of them, eleven regions reaching back to the 1960s, against the registry. Airspace determination history is now visible for 61 percent of US heliports, up from 6.5 percent, and with those unknowns resolved, 2,678 facilities changed risk tier overnight. ELEVATED is no longer the most common risk tier in the American heliport fleet. The week also moved on its own terms: Tampa and Orlando took simultaneous watch upgrades, the first same state corridor pair since tracking began.

Score Changes This Week

4 of 25 tracked markets moved this week; 21 held. Each move is an audited, published change shown with its triggering source.

Phoenix, AZ 53 → 52 -1
Dallas, TX 64 → 63 -1
Columbus, OH 34 → 35 +1
Seattle, WA 26 → 25 -1

Markets to Watch This Week

Top 5 markets by predictive significance, generated from the AirIndex Forward Signals pipeline as of 2026-06-12.

#1 Miami, FL Score 95/100 ACCELERATING
POSITIVE WATCH / IMPROVING Signals 30d: 26 (#3)
Florida: strong enforcement, active DOT · Cluster: Florida Corridor
  • 12 regulatory posture change events tracked (3 high confidence). Regulatory posture shift — typically follows executive order or task force. Validation event only — miami already has full credit on regulatoryPosture. — 30-90 days
  • 8 infrastructure development events tracked (1 high confidence). Infrastructure development announcement — typical permit-to-operational cycle 3-12 months. Validation event only — miami already has full credit on approvedVertiport. — 3-12 months for build/permit cycle
#2 Orlando, FL Score 80/100
POSITIVE WATCH / IMPROVING Signals 30d: 18 (#6)
Florida: strong enforcement, active DOT · Cluster: Florida Corridor
30d forecast: +5 points
  • 18 operator market expansion events tracked (4 high confidence). Operator announcement — follow-on operational events typically follow. — 30-180 days for operational follow-up (+5 points if realized)
  • 10 regulatory posture change events tracked (1 high confidence). Regulatory posture shift — typically follows executive order or task force. Validation event only — orlando already has full credit on regulatoryPosture. — 30-90 days
#3 Charlotte, NC Score 45/100
STABLE / STABLE Signals 30d: 1 (#16)
North Carolina: limited enforcement, emerging DOT · Cluster: Southeast Emerging
30d forecast: +5 points
  • 16 operator market expansion events tracked (5 high confidence). Operator announcement — follow-on operational events typically follow. — 30-180 days for operational follow-up (+5 points if realized)
  • faa certification milestone — Aircraft certification milestone — typically precedes operator deployment by 2-6 months — 60-180 days for operational follow-up (+5 points if realized)
#4 San Francisco, CA Score 75/100
POSITIVE WATCH / IMPROVING Signals 30d: 9 (#8)
California: strong enforcement, active DOT
  • 4 infrastructure development events tracked (0 high confidence). Infrastructure development announcement — typical permit-to-operational cycle 3-12 months. — 3-12 months for build/permit cycle (+15 points if realized)
  • regulatory posture change — Regulatory posture shift — typically follows executive order or task force — 30-90 days (+5 points if realized)
#5 New York, NY Score 60/100
DEVELOPING / STABLE Signals 30d: 166 (#1)
New York: moderate enforcement, emerging DOT · Cluster: Northeast Corridor
  • 35 faa certification milestone events tracked (32 high confidence). Aircraft certification milestone — typically precedes operator deployment by 2-6 months. Validation event only — new_york already has full credit on activeOperatorPresence. — 60-180 days for operational follow-up
  • 620 operator market expansion events tracked (555 high confidence). Operator announcement — follow-on operational events typically follow. Validation event only — new_york already has full credit on activeOperatorPresence. — 30-180 days for operational follow-up

See full ranked digest →

Industry Snapshot

This week the AirIndex pipeline ingested 250 new filings, processed 469 status changes, and logged 2 market-watch updates — 3438 tracked events in all since 2026-06-05. Below are the developments worth your attention.

  • NEW LAWAZ SB1850: Commerce; 2026-2027. →
  • NEW LAWAZ HB4157: Commerce; 2026-2027 →
  • NEW LAWAZ SB1847: General appropriations act; 2026-2027. →
  • NEW LAWAZ HB4154: General appropriations act; 2026-2027 →
  • WATCH CHANGETampa: watch status → POSITIVE WATCH, outlook → IMPROVING
  • WATCH CHANGEOrlando: watch status → POSITIVE WATCH, outlook → IMPROVING
  • NEW LAWPA SB1365: In Multimodal Fund, further providing for use of money in fund; in preliminary provisions relating to aviation, further providing for definitions and for Aviation Restricted Account and providing for Aviation Trust Fund; in authority of Department of Transportation, further providing for authority of department; in obstructions to aircraft operation, providing for prohibited conduct; in airport operation and zoning, providing for abandoned or derelict aircraft and further providing for power to adopt airport zoning regulations; in aviation development, further providing for service fees, for tax on aviation fuels, for allocation of funds, for agreement of maintenance and for tax on jet fuels and providing for tax on alternative aviation fuels and for aviation fees; in liquid fuels and fuels tax, further providing for imposition of tax, exemptions and deductions, for distributor's report and payment of tax, for disposition and use of tax and for refunds; imposing fees; imposing penalties; making transfers; abrogating regulations; and making editorial changes. →

What the Case Files Show

Every heliport in America has two federal paper trails. The registry everyone reads, and the airspace case files behind it, where the FAA records the studies it ran before a landing area was established. The two have never been easy to read together, and since the FAA rebuilt its obstruction evaluation system this year, the case files have been harder to reach than ever. Read side by side, they disagree more than anyone should be comfortable with.

The headline fact: 61 percent of US heliports have an FAA airspace determination on file, most of it invisible until this week. Open any facility on airindex.io and the Q2 row now shows the case number and determination date, linked to the federal record. The other 39 percent read unknown, and for an operator, insurer, or hospital, an unknown there is itself a fact worth acting on.

The new knowledge moved the risk picture the same day. The risk model charges facilities for genuine unknowns, and an airspace determination that cannot be found is one. When 3,075 facilities flipped from unknown to on file, we re assessed the entire fleet: 2,678 facilities changed risk tier overnight, and ELEVATED is no longer the most common tier in the US heliport fleet. MODERATE is, at 3,095 facilities. Nothing physical changed at a single site this week. What changed is how much the record knows, and the score is designed to say so.

The same archive surfaced one more thing: a registry gap finding large enough that it deserves its own research piece rather than a paragraph here. It publishes on airindex.io/research at the start of next week, and subscribers see it here first.

One more stream from the same archive: the FAA now classifies certain airspace studies as Advanced Air Mobility cases, and we ingested all 286. Outside our 25 tracked markets, the heaviest clusters of filed AAM paperwork are:

  • Salinas, California, 13 cases, the densest untracked cluster in the country
  • The Staunton, Waynesboro and Harrisonburg corridor in Virginia, 12 cases
  • Allentown, Pennsylvania, 8 cases, with notable activity around Windsor Locks CT, Schenectady NY, Pittsburgh, and Charleston SC

Filed paperwork is a harder signal than a press release. Our tracked market set stays deliberately closed and human curated, but this is the kind of evidence that starts a promotion conversation.

A Florida Corridor Takes Shape While Phoenix Drifts

The Tampa and Orlando watch upgrades deserve joint reading. Orlando's forward signal profile projects a score increase over the next thirty days, driven by a dense cluster of operator expansion events, and it already sits at the second-highest predictive significance score on the platform. Miami, ranked first, continues to accumulate regulatory and infrastructure validation signals without a projected score change because it has already captured full credit on the underlying factors. What the platform is surfacing is a three-city Florida corridor where Miami anchors the score ceiling, Orlando is closing the gap from below, and Tampa has just entered the signal pipeline. For operators and infrastructure investors comparing site-selection scenarios, Florida now presents the only state with three markets simultaneously on Positive Watch.

Arizona tells a different story. Four new laws were signed this session, spanning commerce authorizations and general appropriations for the 2026-2027 cycle. Yet Phoenix's audited score slipped by a point rather than rising. That gap between legislative volume and score movement is the kind of divergence the classifier is built to flag: new statutes can broaden the legal envelope without immediately producing the operational, infrastructure, or certification milestones that drive score gains. Pennsylvania's SB1365, a sweeping rewrite of the state's aviation fuel-tax and multimodal-fund statutes, similarly represents enabling architecture rather than near-term deployment. Neither bill moves a score today, but both widen the runway for future gains once operator or infrastructure signals follow.

The market to track over the next two weeks is Charlotte. It sits at a modest score but shares Orlando's projected increase, backed by a cluster of high-confidence operator expansion signals and a fresh FAA certification milestone. Charlotte has no watch designation yet; if the projected move materializes, it would become the first market to jump from Stable status directly into score territory that historically triggers a watch review. Subscribers evaluating Southeast exposure should cross-reference Charlotte's timeline against Orlando's: both markets are projecting the same magnitude of gain, but Charlotte is starting from a far lower base, which means the relative signal is louder.

UAM Market Pulse is a weekly intelligence digest from AirIndex. Forward signals are derived from the AirIndex Forward Signals pipeline aggregating classifier outputs, MarketWatch trajectory, and pre-development facility milestones.

AirIndex · UAM Market Readiness Intelligence · airindex.io