Far-out Elevator.

One day you may zoom to a space colony in a high-speed space elevator. Estimated one-way travel time: 5 hours. Ticket price: $220. That's a far better deal than for astronauts today who ride the Space Shuttle to the International Space Station--average travel time: about 2 days. Average cost per person: $1.5 million. "We're looking for ways to build a mass-transportation system between Earth and outer space," says David Smitherman, a technical manager at NASA's Advanced Projects Office. "A space elevator is a very realistic option."

Last fall, Smitherman and other space scientists at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., produced a blueprint for the space-age elevator, which could be in operation before the next century. In the NASA design, the futuristic ride would launch from a 50-kilometer base tower--taller than 131 Empire State buildings stacked end to end! The tower would straddle the equator, a line midway between Earth's Northern and Southern hemispheres. Why there? The equator lies directly beneath Earth's geostationary orbit, a location in space 35,900 km up that stays directly above the same position on Earth, matching its exact rotation rate. The elevator would basically be in orbit around Earth.

Tethered to the tower will be a 36,000-km cable made of carbon nanotube--a new lightweight material 100 times stronger than steel--that anchors to a docking station in a space colony. Four to six elevator tracks--each holding several subway-like cars--would race up the cable, reaching speeds up to thousands of kilometers per hour.

Why would the trip be so cheap? "A space elevator would use less energy than the shuttle," Smitherman says. Electromagnets (magnets that work by electricity) would power the elevator cars.

Want to learn more about NASA's plans for mass-transit space travel? Check out their space transportation Web site at: www.highway2space.com