Virgin Galactic is finally moving to New Mexico’s Spaceport America for tourist flights to space

Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic announced Friday that after years of waiting and delays, it will finally move its operations to Spaceport America, the launch site in rural New Mexico that bills itself as “the world’s first purpose-built commercial spaceport.”

For years the spaceport, which cost New Mexico taxpayers $220 million to build, waited for its anchor tenant to arrive. It stood as a symbol for the uncertain future of whether private companies would one day be able to fly ordinary people to space.