The move is now towards 'speciality telescopes' that do one or two things well. This would be simpler and cheaper. Closure The outlook is poor for one telescope. One suggestion is to make it the main telescope in a network to search for and track potentially Earth-threatening asteroids. Insiders say that the restructuring of British astronomy is the only way that the nation can gain influence in the construction of the large telescopes of the future and provide its large community of astronomers with access to the best equipment.
Studies are underway to build optical telescopes far larger than anything yet constructed.