Hi Sawyer

Some possible propulsion in the near-term is Jordin Kare's laser-launched micro-sail mass-beam driver - mini-sails are boosted to high-speed and ionised via laser before impacting on a magnetic pusher plate on the starship. If the acceleration is low enough the beam power is kept reasonably low and thus not too far away developmentally from what will be required for the space-elevator and solar-powersats.

Thus a logical, developmental progression:

space-elevator => powersats => starprobes

...and of course we can launch, with the SE, super-sized space-telescopes with fold-out mirrors and the like to directly image our target planet/s. If we're patient then we'll wait for star-probe results, but otherwise I suspect there'll be people keen to launch based on telescope results alone. If the unmanned precursors are advanced enough they can build solar-collectors and decceleration beams at the destination. Thus manned vehicles will be able to dispense with deccelerator rings and carry more cargo.

Yet there are destinations closer to home, if Alan Stern and co. are correct - Mars and Earth-sized ice-dwarfs aplenty in the trans-Plutonian spaces. Space-lasers could be used to beam power to colonies on such planets - conceivably terraforming parts of such worlds. Or they may have geothermal power - liquid water under thick ice-sheets?