> but I think most people would acknowledge that on balance, having them them is a good thing.

Of course it is. The next question is "is it a good thing to let a single owner completely control access to this resource?"

We've actually decided in the case of highways and rails, that no, it's not. There needs to be reasonable and non-discriminatory access to these resources otherwise the trade is not worthwhile. We actually have laws that are meant to enforce this.

> the obvious solution would be to provide a small number of orbital observatories to the astronomy community for free or with heavily subsidized pricing.

Define the "astronomy community." Do we do first come first served or do we have a priority list? How do we handle disputes? Is it just US citizens or do we need to offer this to the entire world? What if the vendor fails to make good on their concessions? What sort of penalties should surround this system?

There's really nothing "obvious" about this.