Space hotels

What will space hotels offer?
Space hotels will offer basically the same as hotels on Earth. That is to say, there will be private rooms, you'll get your meals and there might even be bars and wellness areas. However, despite the incredibly high costs, staying in a space hotel will scarcely be a five-star luxury. For example, the meals space tourists will get will be prepared on Earth and reheated in microwave ovens in space. What is more, showers will be carefully sealed affairs to prevent water from floating around the hotel's interior. Nevertheless, there will be much compensation.
Space tourists will be able to enjoy the stupendous view over the Earth and space, they will profit from new kinds of entertainment, such as specially created space sports adapted to zero gravity or even walking around in space, and - of course - they will profit from the possibility of experiencing zero gravity. Space tourists will experience zero gravity during their whole stay in a space hotel unless artificial gravity is provided which might happen at some point using rotating structures as the basis for space hotels. However, this idea still far from becoming reality. Space tourists will also be able to see 16 sunrises and sunsets a day considering that space hotels are intended to orbit around the Earth and that one orbit around the Earth takes 90 minutes.

What will space hotels look like?
Space hotels will develop over time. In the beginning space hotels will most likely look like lodges and only a few guests will be able to be accommodated. 

However, within time they will probably grow bigger in size and look more and more like the hotels we know from Earth. Thus, more guests will be able to be accommodated. Interestingly, basic accommodation in orbit was already designed in 1973. The 'Skylab' space station looked like this: 

Today various designs of possible space hotels look like this:
 

What I find really interesting is that zero gravity will allow architects to build space hotels in almost any shape, size and direction. So, I guess being an architect in the future will be really fun as architects will be able to take their creativity to the next level. Nonetheless, they will also have to come up with some pretty good ideas about how to build, for example, showers or toilets, in the weightless environment of space hotels. (Galactic Suite planned on building a spa filled with water bubbles drifting through the air instead of traditional showers.)
  
This all sounds really great, but how realistic are space hotels?
In 2007 a company from Barcelona called Galactic Suite Limited announced that they were planning on realizing the first space hotel ever in 2012. Today, two years after the originally announced opening, there is still no space hotel in realistic sight.
In 2011 Russian engineers revealed their plans to put a space hotel into orbit 200 miles above Earth by 2016. The hotel would only consist of four rooms and would house up to seven guests. I guess we will have to wait and see how that goes.  
What's for sure is that a lot of progress has been made over the last few years and that most of the technology needed to realize space hotels is available. Thus, someday someone will most likely bring tourists to space, but it may be farther off than we think. Unfortunately creating space hotels requires a lot of money, expertise and careful testing. All of these factors are significantly setting back the realization of space hotels. 

Will staying in space hotels be affordable for ordinary people?

I am sorry to disappoint you, but unless you are a millionaire or are going to win the lottery you probably won't be able to visit a space hotel any time soon. Rich people will be the privileged ones to travel to space for recreational or leisure purposes until the commercialization of space tourism because staying in space hotels will not exactly come cheaply. 
The Russian engineers who plan on realizing a space hotel by 2016 announced, for example, that space tourists will have to pay 500,000 pounds to travel on a Soyuz rocket to get to the hotel before paying another 100,000 pounds for a five-day stay. In comparison to the Galactic Suite offer which will cost you at least three million euros, the Russian offer is quite cheap.


(http://www.spacefuture.com/tourism/hotels.shtml, http://science.howstuffworks.com/hotel-orbit-earth.htm, http://www.theguardian.com/science/2011/aug/27/space-hotel-rich-thrill-world)

The importance of space tourism

Experiencing microgravity, relaxing in a space hotel, looking at the Earth floating in space - travelling to space for recreational or leisure purposes really does sound like a unique adventure. But why would anybody want to create a space tourism industry in the first place and how does society benefit from it?

There are a lot of assumptions about the potential importance of space tourism:

1. Space tourism might become a very lucrative and quickly growing business industry which would generate millions and millions of dollars. 
2. The commercialization of space tourism would significantly decrease the high costs for travelling to space and would not only allow rich, but also ordinary people to travel to space. 
3. Achieving the technological and operational advances required to serve the market of space tourism would allow creating new activities and programs, such as space solar power, space sports, human solar system exploration and settlement.
4. Space tourism is a large industry that would create numerous new job opportunities. 
5. It would give rise to new ideas about what to do in space and how to go about doing them. 
6. Space tourism might be a profitable market to expand life throughout the solar system. With space tourism falling in price and continuous advancements being made in technology, space migration and colonization would become more and more realistic.

To sum up, space tourism is a potentially very lucrative industry that would generate a lot of money. However, money is not the only reason why people are motivated to create this kind of industry. The technolgy necessary for space tourism would also allow creating new activities and programs and may eventually even allow migrating to space permanently. Society would benefit from space tourism in that a lot of new jobs would be created and the human species might be saved from extinction by expanding throughout the solar system.

(http://www.spacefuture.com/archive/space_tourism_its_importance_its_history_and_a_recent_extraordinary_development.shtml)

Abstract CAJ - Space Tourism

Space tourism describes a concept suggesting that ordinary people may sooner or later be able to travel to space and back for recreational, leisure or business purposes. The purpose of this CAJ is to discuss when, how and under which conditions space tourism will come into existence with the focus on the ethical side of space tourism. This is done by discussing existing and planned tourism options of numerous companies and by analysing factors which may delay the realization of space tourism, especially health issues. The information stems from intensive internet research. It has been shown that space tourism will most likely become reality in the course of the next few years assuming that safety, health and legality issues will be resolved. In conclusion, this CAJ demonstrates a possible development of space tourism and shows how it would change people’s lives in the future.

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