National Ambition. Nationwide Opportunity.

Thank you for the opportunity to comment. A country that intends to lead in space must give that ambition a place to take flight and a way to come home. Years of work have brought extraordinary possibilities within reach. The opportunity before the FAA is to help those possibilities become a more regular part of American life, through a national transportation network built to sustain the future taking shape around us.

That work should begin with a clear decision to move on at least one new major launch site as soon as possible. Select the location that can become operational soonest and sustain the flights the country needs. If two locations would deliver a stronger result, advance two. Bring every lawful means of acceleration to that effort, while helping established facilities increase their cadence now.

At the same time, begin financing and developing the connections that will make this investment part of something larger. Places to return deserve the same foresight as places to launch. The airspace between them should become dependable enough for repeated journeys. And promising locations should have a way to begin contributing before the full scale of their future market is known. What we make possible today will help shape what becomes possible tomorrow.

The National Space Transportation Policy has supplied the national ambition. This proceeding can help give that ambition a geography. We can get the next major site moving while building the network that will allow the country to grow beyond it.

Help the next flights happen soonerFAA Questions 1 and 2

Wallops and Kodiak belong near the beginning of that effort. Both give the country an established place from which to expand, while work on the next major facility proceeds.

The Space Force has already shown how much can be gained between flights. GAO reports that changes at its established ranges reduced pad and range reset time from three days to about nine hours.¹ That progress deserves to be carried forward wherever a similar improvement can help the next ready mission proceed.

At Wallops, the opportunity begins with an operation already sending vehicles into the sky. Helping it shorten the interval between missions could produce additional flights while a new spaceport is still under construction. Its physical limits make that parallel approach especially important. The capacity available there should contribute to the immediate need while the country prepares somewhere else to carry further growth. NASA is already seeking industry input on additional payload-processing capability as well as launch capacity at Wallops.² That is a useful place to begin: make room for the work that must be completed before a vehicle can fly.

Kodiak offers a different contribution. Its access to polar orbits gives it a distinct place in the national network, and Rocket Lab’s announced expansion provides a concrete project around which assistance can be organized. The company has announced a Space Force contract for twelve suborbital launches, with up to six additional launches, primarily from its planned Alaska installation. Its later announcement targets a 2027 suborbital debut.³ That gives federal assistance a sequence of missions to help prepare for and an opportunity to turn anticipated flight campaigns into recurring activity.

These sites should be examined as part of the regions around them. Preparing payloads or repairing shared equipment elsewhere could free scarce space at the launch site and keep a ready mission from waiting on work that can be done nearby. Where another pad would remove the bottleneck, help build it.

Give the next locations a way forwardFAA Questions 3 and 4

Camden and Puerto Rico should become active development priorities. Both have appeared in the national discussion long enough to deserve a serious effort to determine what would move them forward.

Camden has an earlier federal review to build upon, but renewed development requires a way to secure the site and carry the project. The federal government should engage state and local partners in resolving that problem. The value of the work already completed will depend on whether it can support a project that reaches construction.

Puerto Rico deserves the same sustained attention. Roosevelt Roads gives that effort a specific place to begin. Its nearby airport and port assets could support a broader space transportation role, provided their condition and availability are established. The cancellation of the earlier launch solicitation leaves a development path to rebuild.⁴ Federal engagement could help the territory turn the next proposal into something capable of proceeding.

Offshore launch opens another direction. The Gulf’s working coast has experience supporting demanding operations at sea. That experience could help connect a shore base to an offshore launch facility and keep the operation supplied between missions. Demonstrating how that entire operation repeats would give the country a stronger basis for investing in offshore capacity.

Washington could give its satellite manufacturers a closer route to space. The Quinault Indian Nation’s Pacific-coast proposal deserves a focused effort to establish whether it can support polar launches, with the Nation and the Navy shaping a workable corridor together. That would bring more of the spaceflight journey into the region.

West Texas could give flight testing a more regular home. Exos’s proposed reusable suborbital campaigns would allow developers to recover their equipment and improve it between flights, helping a new site build an operating record through repeat use.

Sierra Vista brings the other end of the journey into view, with a proposed reentry role built around the airport it shares with Fort Huachuca. The city’s offer to convene regional partners gives the FAA a practical starting point for developing a place to receive vehicles and move their payloads onward.

Houston is also offering its spaceport as a demonstration location for horizontal and high-speed flight within a busy metropolitan aviation system. That gives the FAA a willing airport partner for testing how future services can fit into the airspace people use every day.

These places will contribute differently. A national network allows places to contribute through the functions they can perform well. The purpose of federal engagement should be to help those contributions become possible and connect them to something larger.

Build the connections above the groundFAA Question 5

The airspace connecting these places is part of the infrastructure we need to build.

A new facility becomes more valuable when an operator can depend on opportunities to use it. The same is true for an existing site trying to increase its cadence. Investment on the ground should therefore proceed alongside arrangements that make repeated access to the sky more predictable.

The FAA deserves credit for the progress already made. The agency reports that average launch-related airspace closures have fallen from more than four hours to just over two since 2018.⁵ Together with the Space Force’s work to shorten the interval between launches, this shows how better use of the existing system can help make room for the next stage of growth.

Existing special-use airspace offers a practical foundation to examine. The FAA should identify where established arrangements could support additional activity and where a broader policy change would be necessary. That effort should accommodate the military missions already using the airspace while creating a dependable place for commercial operations within the national system. Where compatible use is possible, establish recurring access arrangements with the agency responsible for that airspace.

These concepts should be simulated and tested. Demonstrations can show whether a proposed arrangement actually helps missions proceed more frequently while reducing avoidable disruption to aviation. Measure how often a ready mission can proceed and how soon aviation regains use of the airspace. Reentry should be included from the beginning, so the system develops around the complete journey.

Flight corridors will also depend on systems that keep operators connected and missions coordinated. CesiumAstro has proposed shared communications infrastructure, and Vicillion has offered to join pilots and working groups for digital spaceflight coordination.⁶ The FAA should bring that expertise into early demonstrations, so those systems develop alongside the operations they are meant to serve.

This is also an opportunity to prepare for transportation still taking shape. Supersonic and hypersonic development will need room to progress, and repeated test flights could be among the first regular uses of newly coordinated airspace. Starfighters Space has supersonic flight-test experience and is developing a platform for broader commercial use, while Venus Aerospace is developing propulsion for future high-speed aircraft. Giving that work dependable opportunities to fly could build experience toward rapid cargo delivery and, eventually, passenger travel. A modern grid, or a reintegration of the one we have, should allow the country to prepare for that future as it answers the immediate demands of spaceflight.

Let the regions help draw the national networkFAA Questions 4 and 5

The FAA and DOT should invite regional perspectives on corridor concepts and help develop them into practical proposals. Bringing neighboring projects into the same discussion would reveal how one facility could make another more useful.

That process could build a region-by-region understanding of the country’s potential. It would give federal agencies a clearer view of where coordination could unlock activity and where an infrastructure investment could serve more than one location. It would also give regional partners a national framework within which to pursue their own ideas.

Along the Gulf of America, one such idea is the Rocket Riviera.

From lower Texas through the Houston region and Louisiana to Florida, the Gulf could develop a connected space transportation economy. Offshore operations would draw on its maritime experience. Connections to Puerto Rico could extend its reach. Suitable inland facilities could help complete the return journey.

Houston offers a practical example of how that development can begin. In 2018, the city approved $18.8 million for infrastructure serving 153 acres of its spaceport, with the work completed in 2019.⁷ A regional effort could build on that approach by funding shared connections that allow an early operation to begin and remain useful as others arrive.

SpaceX’s proposed Starbase Louisiana in Vermilion Parish brings another Gulf opportunity into view. Planning is already underway for the road connections and new power infrastructure the project would require.⁸ Bringing that work into the regional discussion now could help connect a major future facility to the coast around it while nearer-term projects begin contributing.

The Rocket Riviera would build on a coast accustomed to supporting industries that operate beyond the shoreline. The Houston region’s aerospace workforce and Louisiana’s experience in offshore industry give that future a foundation in work already understood. Their skills can help carry an operation through the difficult interval between its first success and dependable service. An offshore demonstration program could put that experience to work, testing launch and recovery concepts with the people who already know how to keep complex operations moving at sea. Federal corridor planning could help those connections take shape, allowing individual projects to contribute to a regional system.

The first projects should make that vision tangible. A partnership that allows an offshore operation to begin would give the idea substance. A return facility that connects arriving payloads to the next stage of their journey would give it another. As those connections develop, the region would have a stronger foundation from which to attract further investment.

For generations, the Gulf has helped feed and fuel this country through shrimp and oil. The same hard work can help carry it into the next era of American transportation. Let the Gulf of America make good on the promise of its new name, with a Rocket Riviera giving this working coast another way to serve the nation and share in its future.

The immediate decision and the larger opportunity can advance together.

Ask what the next stage will requireFAA Question 6

What must be built before the market can fully develop?

Some opportunities will remain out of reach until there is somewhere to pursue them. Public investment can help create that first opening. A shared facility may allow a business to begin operating before it could afford to build an entire site of its own.

NASA’s commercial cargo effort shows how development and demand can grow together. In 2008, the agency awarded contracts for twenty resupply missions while the new systems were still being developed.⁹ Where a public mission needs the service, planning those first purchases alongside the enabling infrastructure could give investors something more concrete than a forecast.

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act has opened a financing path for qualifying spaceport facilities through tax-exempt bonds.¹⁰ Clear guidance from Treasury and the IRS on eligibility and public ownership with private operations would help municipalities and investors turn that authority into workable projects.

Requiring a mature customer base before any enabling infrastructure is built risks holding development at the very point where public investment could make a difference.

How will we demonstrate launch at one site and return to another, in more than one region?

That should become an express part of the national effort, region by region. A demonstration should continue through the receiving operation after landing. It should show how the vehicle or payload reaches its next destination and what would be needed to repeat the journey.

The clock should keep running after touchdown. Show how the vehicle is made safe and moved clear, then when the receiving site can serve its next operation. That interval belongs in the same cadence discussion as the time between launches. Investment in a place to return should help complete today’s mission and prepare for tomorrow’s.

This would give the country experience in operating a transportation network across locations. It would also help establish where dedicated return facilities could make the greatest contribution.

How can this effort inspire more Americans to take part?

That ambition should reach American classrooms now. The FAA and DOT should work with education partners to introduce space infrastructure in middle school and high school, while students are beginning to imagine their futures. Texas Aerospace Scholars’ new senior experience, beginning with Ignition, shows how that invitation can reach students before graduation.¹¹ As the country invests in space transportation, more communities should help young people see a future in the work being built around them. A student should understand how a spaceport works and see a path from the classroom into the work being built nearby. Connecting schools with these projects could turn national enthusiasm into practical preparation for the workforce they will need. The next generation should grow up seeing a place for itself in this future and knowing how to help build it.

The possibilities before us reflect years of dedication from people who believed in this future and kept working to bring it closer. A national commitment to act would meet that determination with momentum. Seeing a long-pursued project enter service can renew the sense of possibility that inspired the work in the first place.

Albert Schweitzer wrote, “Often, too, our own light goes out, and is rekindled by some experience we go through with a fellow-man. Thus we have each of us cause to think with deep gratitude of those who have lighted the flames within us.”¹² There is a place for that kind of renewal in this national effort. A government prepared to act can help that work reach its next chapter.

The fire has been tended through years of difficult work. Now the country has an opportunity to feed it. Let this be the moment when the people who kept this future alive begin to feel the nation moving with them.

Respectfully submitted,

Joshua McElwee
Mulapin Research Group
Fort Myers, Florida
mulapin.org