This is the latest in the series of invited survey articles and has been written in his own imimitable style by Dennis Bushnell, Chief Scientist at the NASA Langley Research Center. Dennis is well known for his far-sighted and often controversial views. He gave the 1998 Wilbur and Orville Wright lecture at the Royal Aeronautical Society and an edited abbreviation of that talk was published in the January 1999 issue of Aerospace International. In this paper Dr Bushnell amplifies and extends the vision of his earlier work. We arc delighted to publish his forecast for civil aviation and would welcome any comments on the projects described.