[quote]The Civil Aviation Authority was tasked with undertaking a review of the possibilities and has delivered an extremely positive verdict - that although there are challenges in launching from the UK, there are no insurmountable obstacles. The emphasis is on the expected emergence of a new breed of low-cost rocket planes that can launch fare-paying passengers to sub-orbital altitudes and also satellites into orbit. Most of these vehicles are still quite a few years away from ever flying, but ministers believe that if the UK gets its act together now, the nation can catch the first wave when it arrives. The economic projections are for a market that could be worth billions by the 2030s, and the UK wants a slice of the action. Virgin Galactic is perhaps the spaceplane concept best known to the public, but there are others being developed in the US, such as Xcor with its two-seater Lynx vehicle. "We expect to start our flight test programme in Q1 of 2015 and be taking people up at the end of 2015 or the beginning of 2016," said Xcor president Andrew Nelson. "We could fly out of Scotland, but we like the look particularly of Newquay. It's excellent that the UK is investigating this because it can only help the market to grow." [/quote] Basically this is mainly because of Skylon and the Sabre Engine it will run being 100% British made and would need a port to fly from, also allowing the UK to attract similar types of rockets. I think NASA has had its time.