In article ,
Hobbs aka McDaniel wrote:
Since a major point of the shuttle was to construct a
space station why didn't construction start with like the
third or fourth shuttle launch in the 1980s?

Because NASA could not get funding to develop the station at the same
time as shuttle development. They were forced to build the shuttle first
and *then* think about the station, which is exactly what they did.

The long delay between starting to think about the station (early 80s)
and starting to build hardware is a complicated story of bureaucratic
ineptness and unfavorable politics.
--
MOST launched 30 June; science observations running | Henry Spencer
since Oct; first surprises seen; papers pending. |