Colorado launches bid for spaceport near Denver

The future of Colorado's commercial space industry may lie out on the wind-whipped runways of Front Range Airport. Colorado is pursuing Federal Aviation Administration​ designation for a spaceport, with Front Range as the likely site for such a facility, Gov. John Hickenlooper announced Wednesday. Front Range is located near Watkins, east of Denver. Its proposed status as "Spaceport Colorado" would allow for creation of a facility offering tourism, travel and cargo transport to space and from point to point on Earth. Spaceports — of which eight are active in the United States — are viewed as important economic-development tools. Front Range, one of the largest general aviation airports in the country, has 4,000 acres of airport property and is surrounded by 6,000 acres of privately owned industrial property, all in an aviation-influence zone, Heap said. The airport has two 8,000- foot-long runways, with plans to lengthen them to 10,000 feet. It has good transportation in Interstate 70 and a rail line to the south. Even Denver International Airport's closeness — a scant 6 miles away — is an advantage, Heap said, saying travelers or cargo can arrive and depart through DIA and conveniently transfer to space planes at Front Range. Those are attributes that don't exist at Spaceport America near Las Cruces, N.M., probably the best known of the U.S. spaceports...more