Around the world, spaceports are popping up in anticipation of a boom in commercial space travel. Spaceport City in is a conceptual design project in Japan that aims to demonstrate the opportunities an urban spaceport could bring for business and travel. Click through to see spaceports around the world.
Space Port Japan Association, Dentsu, Canaria and Noiz Architects
Given its long association with NASA and space travel, it makes sense that the world's first urban spaceport is in Houston, Texas. Just 15 minutes from downtown, the spaceport is part of an expansion of Ellington Airport.
Courtesy Houston Airports
Completed in 2014, Spaceport America in New Mexico was the world's first spaceport purpose-built for commercial space travel. Private companies including Virgin Galactic and UP Aerospace use it as their base.
Nigel Young/Foster + Partners
One of the best known space stations in the world, Kennedy Space Center in the US has been a NASA base for nearly 60 years. It was the launch site for all the Apollo missions, including the moon landings in 1969. Its site is currently being expanded to include opportunities for commercial spaceflight.
Tony Gray and Tim Powers/NASA
In Swedish Lapland, Kiruna has been a "space city" since the Swedish Institute of Space Physics and Esrange Space Center were built there in the 1950s. Spaceport Sweden plans to develop a facility offering spaceflights to tourists, as well as educational facilities and training programs.
Spaceport Sweden AB
Offering low-orbit commercial spaceflight for satellites, US company Rocket Lab Launch Complex has multiple launch sites around the world. Its southern hemisphere base, in Mahia on the east coast of New Zealand's North Island, is expanding to a second launch pad later this year, and aims to make the future of space travel competitive for private companies.
Rocket Lab
Despite being 200 miles (322 kilometers) from Baikonur, Kazakhstan's famous cosmodrome is named after the town. That's because it was built during the 1950s, at the height of the Cold War, and the Soviet Union wanted to hide its real location. Baikonur has launched a lot of firsts including Sputnik 1, the first of Earth's artificial satellites; Yuri Gagarin, the first human to travel to outer space; and the world's first space tourist, Dennis Tito, who joined two Russian astronauts on the Soyuz TM-32 mission in 2001.
Roscosmos Press Office/TASS/Getty Images
Formerly known as Front Range Airport, this small base in Colorado was announced as the US's 11th spaceport in 2018, and renamed Colorado Air and Space Port (CASP). Technological and scientific research, as well as commercial space travel, are planned for the base.
Design concept by HDR in association with Luis Vidal + Architects
In 2019, the UK government announced Cornwall Airport Newquay as a new spaceport base, with satellite launches expected as early as 2021. Working with Virgin Orbit on horizontal launches, the airport was selected for its long runway.
