This Weekend: Park Ferrari, Take Piaggio

by Gunnar Heinrich ::: img Piaggio Aero ::: Piaggio P180 Avanti II

THE weekend’s upon us. So let’s say you live in New York and want to go chill with Barry on the Vineyard. Roadtrip? Great! And you just took delivery of a spanking new Ferrari 458 Italia – what better excuse than to stretch its nimble legs cross New England? Except for one bloody problem – traffic. Brutal, democratic traffic.

What to do? Well, if you’ve thumbed through this month’s DuPont Registry you might notice an advert for the Piaggio P-180 Avanti II.

It’s an unusual Italian prop plane with two sets of wings, aft-facing Pratt & Whitney propellers, and features a very slick fuselage that looks just like a jet from your wildest James Bond fantasy but  – Piaggio claims – the plane costs a (sizeable) fraction of the price to own and operate.

Attaining a jet-like max speed of Mach .7, max ceiling of 41,000 ft, and a max range of 1,800 nautical miles, for the well financed traveler the P-180 seems to represent upward mobility at a relative bargain.

How relative?

An entry level Gulfstream with similar performance (though longer range @ 2,500 miles) costs $11 million to acquire to say nothing of the higher maintenance costs that are associated with planes powered by jet propulsion.

The P-180, by contrast, will set you back $5 million or so and consume fuel at just under 100 gallons an hour which is better they say, though it makes the 458 Italia look very frugal.

Still, what price to be above the weekend fray and with friends in no time?