The world’s first commercial passenger spaceship moved a step closer to takeoff, as Richard Branson unveiled a new runway at a remote New Mexico spaceport.

Branson and New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson on Friday hosted a ceremony marking the completion of the main runway at Spaceport America, near the town of Las Cruces where the Virgin Galactic project is based.

“This is the beginning of the second space age and we are proud to have been supporters of this part of the story.

“From here we will see, perhaps daily flights into space, but also scientists, explorers of new opportunities beyond our planet,” he told reporters.

The world’s first commercial spaceship made its first manned free flight over California Sunday and successfully landed at Mojave Air and Space Port.

Virgin Galactic, the US company developing the world’s first commercial manned space flight system and tourism business, announced the successful completion of the first piloted free flight of SpaceShipTwo, named the VSS Enterprise.

The spaceship was released from its mothership, the four-engined aircraft dubbed Eve, at an altitude of 45,000 ft (13,700 metres), the company said.

Richard Branson said Monday that Virgin Galactic is on track to offer commercial space travel within 18 months. Space hotels are next on the drawing board.

The project’s SpaceshipTwo, an aircraft built by aviation engineer Burt Rutan and designed to carry paying customers into suborbital space, had its maiden flight in the California desert in March.

“We just finished building SpaceShipTwo. We are 18 months away from taking people into space,” Branson told a business conference in Kuala Lumpur, adding that the fare will start at 200,000 dollars.

In California yesterday, space tourism company Virgin Galactic unveiled a craft designed to carry passengers on short flights into space.

800 press, future astronauts and VIP guests gathered in the desert for a press conference and to view the roll out of the world’s first commercial spaceline.

The design of SpaceShipTwo will be refined during an extensive test flying programme to commence shortly.

Manchester City football clubowner Sheikh Mansour has added space travel to his diverse portfolio of businesses by buying 32 per cent of Virgin Galactic.

The deal, which was done through the sheikh’s company Aabar, puts the value of Virgin Galactic at $900 million even though it hasn’t begun to offer flights yet.

In return it will gain regional rights to host Virgin Galactic tourism and research flights, and is planning to build spaceport facilities in Abu Dhabi.

The era of space tourism has begun. Out in the Mojave desert, Virgin Galactic has unveiled, the WhiteKnightTwo, the new transport ship they’ll be using to carry their not-yet-unveiled SpaceShipTwo into suborbital space.

The passenger ship is then launched from the underside of WhiteKnightTwo to continue its ascent to the very edge of space, about 65 miles (104 kilometers) above Earth.

With a 140-foot wingspan, it’s the largest all-carbon composite aircraft ever built and many of its component parts have been built using composite materials for the very first time (A major benefit of using carbon composites is fuel efficiency.)