Hotels on the moon? The worst travel predictions of all time

Few things age worse than a duff prediction. And the world of travel is home to some of the biggest clangers.

Promises of flying taxis, supersonic jets, hotels on the moon and underwater resorts have been kicking around for decades now. And yet most of these futuristic visions have remained just that. Perhaps it’s something hardwired in us that loves the idea of space-age transport.

In the 1980s, for example, Isaac Asimov was amused to discover a series of 19th-century French paintings imagining life in the 2000s – including flying cars.

Admittedly, we shouldn’t be too down on the dreamers. After all, the likes of self-driving taxis, ultra-speedy maglev (”magnetic levitation”) trains, in-flight Wi-Fi and the Channel Tunnel have all defied the doubters to become reality. Still, that shouldn’t stop us from enjoying a chuckle at some of these wide-of-the-mark predictions...

London to New York in an hour (1953)

Few travel predictions have been around the block as many times as the promise of super-speedy flights between London and New York – typically somewhere between 60 and 90 minutes. Newspaper archives reveal that this tantalising prospect actually dates back to the 1950s, when the Gleaner, a Jamaican newspaper, featured a comment made by from a British aviation executive predicting that the dream would become a reality before long.

There was Concorde, of course, which managed to slash the typical London-New York flight by more than 50 per cent. But it’s been more than 20 years since the supersonic jet took to the skies. It isn’t that technology hasn’t advanced, it’s the challenges of converting these breakthroughs to civilian aviation, where planes are much bigger and regulations much stricter.

A Hilton on the moon (1958)

To be fair to the famous hotel chain, there’s no record that the company actually stated its intention to build a hotel on the moon. But that’s certainly the impression that some of its investors and delegates got when Conrad Hilton used a lavish conference to unveil an ambitious dance-show set at the “Lunar Hilton”.

Naturally, the event set tongues wagging, leading to feverish speculation about plans for an intergalactic hotel. Before long, the idea had seized the US’s imagination, popping up in everything from The Jetsons to 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Mobile travel pods (1997)

Anyone who has baulked at the current price of hotel rooms may have some sympathy for this one: a futuristic, yurt-style travel pod that allows you to bed down wherever you like. That was the concept mooted by the San Francisco-based design studio Kyu Che when it revealed the Lifepod – an “environmentally low-impact capsule dwelling unit” – in 1997.

Sadly, the idea doesn’t seem to have progressed beyond that stage, which perhaps makes sense when you think of the obvious questions it raises – like what differentiates it from a tent?

Laser-powered planes (2002)

Speedier alternatives to jet planes have become a staple of futuristic travel predictions, with dozens of examples over the years of advances that are apparently on the verge of changing the way we fly for the better. In 2002, Dr Leik Myrabo, an American aerospace professor, caused a flurry of excitement with his prediction that the heat caused by high-powered lasers colliding with the right surface could be enough to propel a plane at several times the speed of sound.

Dr Myrabo was able to demonstrate this in small-scale experiments. Unfortunately, as is often the case, there is a big jump between cutting-edge aerospace research and what’s possible in the world of commercial aviation.

Commercial space travel (2004)

It’s now more than 20 years since Sir Richard Branson stunned the world by launching Virgin Galactic – the first specialist commercial space flight company – prompting some 250,000 wannabe astronauts to purchase a ticket to the stars. In defence of the venture, Virgin Galactic is very much operational and has completed seven commercial space-flights since 2021 taking 37 passengers into space. That puts it considerably ahead of many other headline-grabbing ventures over the years.

Yet there’s no denying that, despite Sir Richard’s valiant efforts, the concept of mainstream space travel has yet to fulfil its promise. Anyone looking for a seat on Virgin Galactic’s Delta space craft (set to voyage in 2026) will face a six-figure price tag, along with a hefty waiting list.

Flying hotels (2004)

Back in the early 2000s, the British holiday company Thomas Cook organised a Future Holiday Forum to explore tomorrow’s travel trends. One of the presentations came courtesy of travel consultancy WATG, which regaled guests with its plans for a helium-filled airship hotel – essentially, a giant blimp-like structure which would let guests enjoy high-end hospitality while floating thousands of feet above the Earth.

WATG stressed that the airship hotel would cruise at a leisurely speed, allowing passengers to take in the views without worrying about travel sickness and losing their breakfast. That’s still a lot quicker than the project itself taking off, which seems to have stalled in the past 20 years.

Underwater resorts (2006)

If one destination deserves to be called the capital of madcap travel ideas over the decades it’s surely Dubai. Many of the most unlikely proposals hark back to the mid-2000s, when the Middle East’s emerging mega city was in the midst of a major building boom. This proved to be catnip to visionaries keen to pitch larger-than-life ideas.

Step forward the German architect Joachim Hauser and his plans for the world’s first underwater resort – to be built off the coast of the Palm Jumeirah – combining submarine villas with five-star facilities. Needless to say, the project never happened. Just like the “seven-star” Apeiron island resort (a gigantic artificial island with private lagoons) and the space-like rotating tower villas that were also being touted to prospective investors at the time.

Predictions for the future of travel

Flying taxis

Will Dubai’s clogged traffic soon be a thing of the past? As of 2026, the Gulf city is set to open its first “vertiports” (including one at Dubai International Airport), allowing helicopter taxis to ferry passengers to and from some of its busiest destinations.

The end of airport queues…

In his recent vision for the future of travel, “futurologist” Tom Cheesewright forecast that passport security queues could be on their way out. He predicts that the rapid rise of biometric technology will result in authorities being able to scan our faces and bio-data without having to check our personal documents.

…and perhaps passports too

As ambitious as Cheesewright’s prediction may sound, he’s not alone in his techno-optimism. One of the UK’s most senior border officials, Phil Douglas, is on record as saying that biometric technologies could even make paper passports obsolete before long. “The technology already exists to support that,” he told a conference in 2023.

Airport cities

Are airports set to get even bigger? In its forecast for the next 30 years of travel, business consultants Oliver Wyman has predicted the rise of “aerotropolises”, as huge international airports expand to include full-scale shopping centres, entertainment complexes, hotels and leisure facilities. It points to Singapore’s Changi Airport as leading the way on that front.