Lets say a medium sized town wanted to build a space rocket, do you think they would be able to get the.....?

Question

resources needed to build one?

Answer 1

Depends on where. Usually this is decided by the Leaders in Govt.

Answer 2

It doesn't sound very realistic. Even an unmanned rocket costs a lot of money to design, build and launch, several millions of dollars at least. A manned one is even more expensive; the SpaceShipOne team spent some $20 to $30 million on their vehicle, which was still suborbital and quite small. Over a period of years or decades a town could theoretically put together the money necessary to build and launch a small rocket, however this would require either raising money from donations or diverting city funds away from normal civil projects.

To put it into perspective, the city of Toronto had a budget of some $5.6 billion in 1999. Its population at that time was around 2.4 million, which comes to about $2300 per capita for the city budget. Divide $30 million by $2300 and you get about 13000, which is therefore the rough number of people who would have to live in a canadian city in order for that city to be able to raise the equivalent of the money spent on the SpaceShipOne project in a single year, assuming their entire budget was put towards the project. The time taken to raise the money would vary proportionally with both the population of the city and the fraction of the budget put towards the project, so for example a city of 30000 people putting 12% of their budget towards the rocket would take about three and a half years to raise $30 million. Obviously towns in less developed countries would take far longer to raise the money, and would require more money as well due to not already having the necessary technology.

Answer 3

Yes. Wouldn't be easy. If I were trying it I'd work it as part of a degree program at a college. It covers so many fields you could get the whole school involved.

Answer 4

I think a town of 10,000 could build a rocket that could reach space with a 100 pound payload.  Towns in the US purchase million dollar schools.  And you can buy a trip to space for $10 million today (not for a person).  So, even if everyone were stupid, they should be able to buy a rocket on the open market.

There are a couple individuals who are building such rockets.  And of course, a very small company, Scaled Composites has repeatedly launched humans to over the 62 mile altitude considered to be the start of space.  A small town would likely have to attract some non-local talent for this.

Answer 5

It depends on the details of your proposal.

Designing a rocket of any size requires only the brains and the time to do it.  Most medium-sized towns I've lived in could probably muster up the brains and the time.  That's as long as it doesn't have to actually work.

But to actually build and operate a "space rocket" (i.e., one large enough to carry a useful payload into orbit) would take heavy, high-precision manufacturing and assembly resources that most towns don't possess and couldn't afford.  The development budget for a new launch vehicle can reach billions of dollars, which is often even outside the capacity of entire states.