These futuristic flying pods could make driving history

Imagine if instead of wasting hours in traffic, you could  one day fly above it for a price only slightly higher than a subway ride.

That's the idea behind SkyTran, a self-driving monorail designed to hover 20 feet above roads and travel up to 155 mph. The system would turn a two-hour car commute into a 10-minute trip, SkyTran CEO Jerry Sanders tells Tech Insider.

The company just announced that it will launch its first-ever track in Lagos, Nigeria by 2020. The World Bank commissioned Systra, a global transportation consulting firm, to find a railway that could help alleviate traffic in the city, and SkyTran was chosen.

Lagos has some of the worst traffic jams in the world, due largely to its island-locked financial hub and exponential population growth. To put things in perspective, the city has more than twice the population as New York City but roughly the same land area.

"Everyone hates commuting, but there are no solutions," Sanders tells Tech Insider. "The only way to get around traffic is to literally go above it."

Take a look.