Suborbital tourism, which costs hundreds of thousands of dollars for a few minutes of levitation, is a definite waste of money. The experience is giddy, yet inconsequential, since the tourist does not get anything he or she would not get from a simulated weightlessness experience in a looping jumbo jet at a fraction of the cost. Some say that suborbital flights prepare the ground for the next level of space tourism, in Earth’s orbit and beyond. However, the market costs and the ability to really host people on a commercial space station are an order of magnitude above and beyond the stunts planned by companies like Virgin Galactic.
If the uselessness of suborbital tourism were not ridiculous on its own merits, add to it the headaches it will create for flight controllers, especially if the mega rich do not exhaust their enthusiasm for fake space orgasms soon.
With space tourism carriers like Virgin Galactic and XCOR planning multiple suborbital flights per day, and orbital flyers like SpaceX, Sierra Nevada, and Bigelow sending people and material into orbit, the skies will be getting crowded. The suborbital “up-and-down” space tourism flights offered by carriers like Virgin Galactic and XCOR may number anywhere from several hundred to multiple thousands a year – from zero today. Airline passengers will be less than thrilled to accept a lengthy delay so a rock star can sing in space or a billionaire can hang out in a “space hotel.” Also, airlines lose money from delays, or from re-routing around special-use airspace, requiring extra fuel burn.
via How Will Space Commuters Navigate A Thicket Of Air Traffic? | Popular Science.
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