baton colony

Problem: the ISS is zero-G because supposedly building a hab large enough
to rotate to create simulated gravity without coriolis dangers would be too
costly.

So how about this--a "baton colony," two inflatable Bigelow habs connected
by a quarter mile (or so) of tether, or (later) by a truss, and rotating
about their center of mass. All that would have to be put into orbit at
first is two habs and a reel of tether material. The habs would have to
have some kind of thruster to begin and control motion, and they would have
to fire in coordination to create stable rotation and not pull the whole
structure out of the proper orbit. Docking would be tricky until the truss
was built. Ultimately it would probably work best to have a third hab at
the center of rotation, to provide stable docking and thrust control. With
the central hab in place, the structure should be scalable over time, adding
new trusses or just adding onto the habs already in place. In a few years
or decades when you connect enough habs, you have a torus.

But the cost of the initial infrastructure would be in line with what
Bigelow and other space investors envision, so it should be do-able by a
private organization.

BradW