Ever since Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, an eminent Russian rocket scientist, first put forward the idea of a "space elevator," in 1895, enthusiasts have dreamed of traveling to space using not much more than a long piece of cable and a boxcar. But until recently, few, if any, companies had actually proposed building one.

That is, until a large Japanese construction company, called Obayashi, stepped forward last month. Obayashi announced that it wanted to send a cable 60,000 miles into space, and suspend it there with a counterweight. Passengers would travel to a terminal station at 22,000 miles (see diagram) propelled at 200 kilometers an hour, possibly using a maglev-type magnetic railway. And the trips would last about a week. Obayashi said it hoped to complete the project by 2050.

Now, if you think all that sounds a bit far-fetched, you’re not alone. That’s what self-identfying members of the "space elevator community" think too.

"I think it’s great marketing on their part. They received a ton of publicity because of it, but do I see Obayashi building an elevator by 2050? No," said Marc Boucher, editor of SpaceRef, and Spaceelevator.com. "If someone is going to build an elevator, it’s going to be part of a consortium. It’s not a mega-project, but a super-mega-project, like the International Space Station."

Michael Laine, CEO of space elevator developer LiftPort, notes that several large companies, including Google, Otis, and Lockheed Martin, have made announcements about space elevators in the last decade, each generating "a fair amount of viral buzz." But to "the best of my knowledge, none of these organizations have ever contacted anyone in the elevator community that I know. And after more than a decade, I know just about every serious researcher in the field."

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