Can the falcon 9 fix the Hubble? I agree having a space plane as your only launch vehicle is very short sighted but I think a space plane has some very unique capabilities.
Maybe. There's a plan to use the Dragon capsule to reboost the Hubble and possibly EVA to it. No one knows what exactly will happen, although if you're interested in learning more, the potential mission is Polaris II[1].
But that ignores the bigger point - the Shuttle had a bunch of rarely used capabilities. And the tradeoff for that is that it's main mission: taking people and cargo to space was severely compromised.
It would have been easy to just buy a new Hubble with the savings if the US had a reasonably designed and priced rocket instead of the Shuttle.
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Well, yes - that's kind of the point. If NASA didn't have the Shuttle's fully amortized $1.5B/launch cost weighing it down they'd have been able to do a lot more things.
> Also, how are you getting that new Hubble off the ground without a shuttle?
Who knows what rocket NASA should have gone with. But the easy answer is: they could have kept Saturn V around for the few really big payloads they needed it for.
Another option is the Delta IV Heavy. It's longest fairing is just a little bit short of what's needed for Hubble. I'm sure a 1-off xl fairing would be quite expensive, but since the difference between a Delta IV Heavy launch and a Shuttle launch is $1B, there's quite a bit of room in the budget to work with.
"Well, yes" sounds so smarmy. Well yes, I wasn't disputing the fact either. It is just reinforcing information
Nope. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_National_Reconnaissance_O...
"On February 17, 2016, the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope (then known as the Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope or WFIRST) was formally designated as a mission by NASA, predicated on using one of the space telescopes."
> Also, how are you getting that new Hubble off the ground without a shuttle?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nancy_Grace_Roman_Space_Telesc...
"As of July 2022, Roman is scheduled to be launched on a Falcon Heavy rocket under a contract specifying readiness by October 2026 supporting a NASA launch commitment of May 2027."
Can it get people there to get out into space and turn some wrenches? Absolutely.
Could it haul a new full-diameter mirror? No. It's constrained by it's diameter, and the cargo capacity is the Dragon's trunk. Bigger rockets may be required, but nothing about the shuttle is strictly necessary there.
The thing the "space plane" had that was entirely unique was the capability to load something large into the cargo bay and bring it back down. But in practice that capability was barely ever used. Starship might eventually offer that capability, but it won't be as gentle as a shuttle landing.
There may one day again be a beautiful space plane, should that particular need become important again.