Washington, DC— SpaceX founder Elon Musk unveiled his company’s prototype Thursday for a spacecraft that could shuttle astronauts both to and from Earth. The unit, dubbed Dragon V2, is a tremendous step towards more cost-effective space travel than today’s version of throwing $500 million at a rocket launch that mostly floats away in space. It is also another small, but important, step towards any hope of making the adventures of “Star Trek” a reality.
With the unveiling of Dragon V2 by SpaceX, the combined efforts of multiple transit authorities in the United States such as the MTA, CTA, METRO, and MBTA have unveiled a prototype of their own: the space tollbooth. With the space tollbooth, the transit authorities involved plan to regulate space travel and maintain cosmic space-ways for a modest fee.
“This isn’t like the Old West where a horse and buggy rip through piles of dirt for miles,” stated MTA spokesperson Matthew Hemmersol at a press conference. “This is friggin space. Someone has to maintain it to make sure rockets can get to where they need to go.”
Hemmersol went on to say that cosmic travel may become “rife with wormholes” and “space garbage.”
“Do you want save a few million dollars and risk having your shuttle get stuck in the middle of an inter-dimensional time warp that could add months to your travel time? Of course not,” exclaimed Hemmerson.
The proposed tollbooths for space travel will be a continually expanding project as shuttles travel further and further. Fees may be assessed in a turnpike sort of fashion, with tolls accruing at each 200,000 mile mark. “But don’t worry about having cash on hand. All space tollbooths will accept E-ZPass as well,” promised Hemmersol.
When asked how much money the transit authorities may take in as profit per year, Hemmersol laughed and stated, “Please. With all of the maintenance we’ll have to do to space, where could there possibly be room for profit? These companies do this for the sake of all space travelers.”
At the end of the press conference, reporters were somewhat surprised to find tollbooths had been erected at the exit to the conference’s facility.