Joann Evans wrote in message
...

Note that these designs were first proposed in the late 1960's,
without benefit of composite materials, and other advances since then.
There's no current government mission (at that time, it was believed
there would be) or commercial requirement for this lifting capability,
but plenty of thought has been put into them (and seemingly forgotten
by many), and we should be able to do this, when there's more
experience with smaller RLVs, and the need presents itself....

Okay, thanks a lot for the review with those links. I'm not current
with that sort of thing, and I didn't realize so much was on the web.
I can't get my mind around how expensive it would be though, nor
can I predict how long it might take given the go. Can someone?

But what you plan to do with the passengers once in LEO, I'm
still not sure.

I find the ion-engine work at JPL and Bill Clark's work encouraging.
If we can get enough people up, maybe we can get some of them out.

I can only say that it's doable.

Thanks again. I'm guardedly optimistic. My experience with such
things is mostly practical. If we know there's a place in space worth
exploring, and if we have the capability to get there, it does seem
that it would be a real shame not to try after coming this far so fast.

--
John Thomas Maxson, Retired Engineer (Aerospace)
Author, The Betrayal of Mission 51-L (www.mission51l.com)