SpaceportAmerica

Plans For Spaceport America Revealed

Filed under: Wings

We first heard about the plans for Virgin Galactic and Spaceport America back in December 2005. The home base for space travel promises to bring space tourism to the New Mexico desert. Now the team of US and British architects and designers working on the project have released design renderings of Spaceport America. The design is from a US-British consortium of URS Corporation and Foster + Partners and shows a low-slung design which is tucked into the earth and uses passive energy for heating and cooling with photovoltaic panels for electricity and water recycling. Massive windows open out to the runway. People enter through a deep channel cut in the landscape. The terminal and hanger are expected to cost around $31 million and construction will begin in 2008 with late 2009 or early 2010 projected as a completion date. Big pics of the design drawings in the gallery.

[via Aero-News Network]

Gallery: Spaceport America