March 1, 2025 | Evan Williams
NASA’s John F. Kennedy Space Center is as much an idea as it is a real place, an American one about bravery, will and determination, and the grandeur of space travel — mythologized by Hollywood in movies such as Apollo 13 and Fly Me to the Moon. Both were filmed partly at KSC, which is of course real enough. The world’s preeminent but aging spaceport is located on 6,000 acres of Merritt Island along the Atlantic Coast.
The working spaceport is busier than ever due to the rapid increase in public-private partnerships over the last decade between NASA and commercial interests such as SpaceX and Blue Origin. Employment by commercial launch providers surged 100% in the last seven years, NASA says. In 2022, KSC supported 57 rocket launches; in 2024, 93 launches; by 2030, 200-plus launches per year are expected.
It's also a major tourist destination. About 1.65 million people visited the 70-acre KSC Visitor Complex in 2023. Built in 1967, it features a Rocket Garden with artifacts from the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs, a 10,000-sq.ft. Exploration Station, IMAX movies, bus tours and other attractions. A one-day pass for adults is $75. There are also various package deals.
“(The) Visitor Complex has done a remarkable job preserving history, fostering curiosity and looking forward to the future,” says Meagan Happel, public relations manager and film commissioner for the Space Coast Office of Tourism. “It is one of the top draws for visiting the Space Coast. Where else can you see space flown vehicles, meet an astronaut, and watch history in the making with frequent rocket launches?”
All that makes KSC an economic engine supporting around 35,000 jobs, generating $286.6 million a year in state taxes, and producing an $8.2-billion annual economic output, NASA says. But after all these years, it needs major updates to accommodate commercial innovation, says Rob Long, Space Florida’s president and CEO. “As these innovations mature, their integration into existing aerospace infrastructures will demand significant advancements in air traffic management, regulatory frameworks and safety protocols.”
The government in 1961 acquired the land where KSC now exists for the Apollo program, three years after NASA was founded. That year, at what is now Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, an adjacent partner to KSC, NASA sent the second person and first American into space. A Mercury-Redstone “Freedom 7” rocket carried Alan B. Shepard Jr. into the heavens for 15 minutes and 28 seconds. Three weeks later, President John F. Kennedy announced that the U.S. aimed to put a man on the moon. (Tourism officials estimate that historic launches now often draw 100,000 or more in-person viewers.)
On July 1, 1962, the subsequently renamed KSC was founded. Today, NASA is still a standard-bearer of the dream to discover new life in the universe and the idea that people will one day live on other planets.