section_path: Passenger travel via spacecraft
section_name: Passenger travel via spacecraft
paragraph_text: Passenger travel via spacecraft
  
  Over the decades, a number of spacecraft have been proposed for spaceliner passenger travel. Somewhat analogous to travel by airliner after the middle of the 20th century, these vehicles are proposed to transport large numbers of passengers to destinations in space, or on Earth via suborbital spaceflights. To date, none of these concepts have been built, although a few vehicles that carry fewer than 10 persons are currently in the test flight phase of their development process.
  
  One large spaceliner concept currently in early development is the SpaceX Starship, which, in addition to replacing the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launch vehicles in the legacy Earth-orbit market after 2020, has been proposed by SpaceX for long-distance commercial travel on Earth, flying 100+ people suborbitally between two points in under one hour, also known as "Earth-to-Earth".
  
  Small spaceplane or small capsule suborbital spacecraft have been under development for the past decade or so; as of 2017, at least one of each type is under development. Both Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin have craft in active development: the SpaceShipTwo spaceplane and the New Shepard capsule, respectively. Both would carry approximately a half-dozen passengers up to space for a brief time of zero gravity before returning to the launch location. XCOR Aerospace had been developing the Lynx single-passenger spaceplane since the 2000s, but development was halted in 2017.