NASA Plans $40-Million Visitor Facilities, Exhibits for Houston

The Johnson Space Center announced plans Wednesday to build a $40-million visitors’ center with a mini-Astrodome and two high-tech movie theaters.

The visitors’ center will be built on 123 acres of unused land at the Johnson Center, and National Aeronautics and Space Administration officials hope to have it open by 1989.

A large geodesic dome, a small-scale version of Houston’s Astrodome, will be the central structure of the center. Part of the complex will be a space education center dedicated to the crew members killed in the space shuttle disaster.

Plans call for a nonprofit foundation, the Manned Space Flight Education Foundation Inc., to receive a license to build and operate the center.

Will Issue Bonds

Harold Stall, president of the foundation and space center public affairs director, said the foundation will issue tax-free bonds to pay for construction. The bonds will be repaid with admission fees and sales of souvenirs and food at the center. Stall said the foundation expects about 1.7 million people a year to visit the center.

Planned for the new center are:

--A simulated lunar landscape, with a full-scale lunar lander, lunar car and scientific equipment.

--A Mission Control Center simulation.

--An exhibit hall that will include a spacecraft from the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo eras, a full-scale mock-up of Skylab, a bookstore and gift shop, and food services.

--Two 800-seat theaters.