Starship design in Star Trek has been a subject of endless fascination & creativity for me growing up. When I was younger (in the mid 2000s) I would sit doodling my own ships during school then again when I got home. I loved the Connie refit & all its FASA variations. But the Galaxy in my young mind was something too complex and elegant to replicate. There was always just something about it that set it apart from every other starship design that I just couldn't put my finger on. Now a disclaimer, this isn't a post saying "the Galaxy Class is the best starship ever" as the original Connie is iconic and every design since has its merits, but the Galaxy was such a contraversial & radical departure from what we saw before - an 'evolution' of starship design and what came with it was an evolved Starfleet & the Federation as a whole. Its one of only a few starship classes that was specifically designed during peacetimes for a primary exploratory & diplomatic role within its organisation (hence all the families on board). Even despite this evolved nature the Galaxy still boasted cutting edge defensive and offensive technologies, including the most advanced starship computer core of its time, according to some canon-ish sources. If we compare the Galaxy to the Connie Refit and Miranda classes, its simply a night and day difference. Fresh, curved lines, its sheer scale and yet just as robust and intimidating as any other starship to date. Its small warp nacelles relative to the connie gave the impression of refined technology & its massive saucer boasted more scientific and personell infrastructure than any other starship. Yes we have seen other radical starships such as the Enterprise J & Dauntless, but the Galaxy in my opinion still stood out as a huge leap after what came before. Was anyone on here around when it was first revealed in the 1980s? What was the reaction like? Did most fans like the design?
I loved it when I first saw it, it hit me in ways that the original Connie didn't. It made the TOS Connie look "Primitive" with it's smooth curves, organic shaping, and complex layout, while being simple in over-all design. It's definitely the ship I would want to live on if exploring the frontiers of space. As far as "Latest Hardware" for Offense/Defense/Sensors/etc, that will almost always advance with time. But as far as shaping in terms of Aesthetic, it's hard to beat the "Galaxy-class". It sets a very high standard that only the Odyssey class has really come close to, even then I think the Odyssey class made a few mistakes with it's "Neck Design".
I think it's certainly true that the Galaxy-class has a certain grandeur and vision that other classes of starship have just lacked, including later designs like the Sovereign. Reading up on Andrew Probert's reasons for why it's designed the way it is makes it much more difficult to criticise his design choices. He really thought it through beyond "I just think it looks cool". I am a complete convert to the Galaxy-class.
I wasn't old enough in '87 to have an initial reaction, but I did get started on "Star Trek" with "TNG" and grew up with the Enteprise-D so to me she will always be more than a ship and more like a television home for me. It's hard for me to be objective when it comes to "TNG" and the D. That said, I have always admired the sense of grace and presence the design has. As @Macintosh says when you read about how Mr. Probert developed her design and WHY things look the way they do, it's all the more easy to love her. I've never gotten the criticisms of the design, though I will say that special effects during "TNG" didn't fully do her justice. Some of my favorite moments in "DS9" were seeing Galaxy-class ships portrayed as more than space hotels. I was pretty annoyed when "Generations" killed her, and still think the movies would have been fine using her. Spoiler: Star Trek: Picard And of course then there's "Star Trek: Picard"... I'm so happy she got the museum retirement she deserved after getting to kick ass one more time. Beyond the aesthetic, there really doesn't seem to be any other Starfleet ship that has been so good at everything in such ample abundance as the Galaxy-class.
One of my favourite Galaxy-class easter eggs in the whole franchise – this is the USS Galaxy herself, NCC-70637, kicking ass and taking names at the first Battle of Chin'toka!
The Galaxy class stands out in any scene it is in, for good or for ill. I would be hard pressed to say it is a "peak" of starship design, especially given the limited knowledge of starship designs at the time it came out, but I always do appreciate the overly enthusiastic posts by lovers of the design.
For me it's among the most realistic ships ever in Star Trek. Real space does not hide a Klingon around every asteroid. It's just far larger and emptier than most people choose to attempt to fathom. There will not be borders, or fleets facing off in it. At least not against comparable aliens. If we're to go out into it, unless we invent wormhole tech or some other form of short-duration travel, we'll likely want to go into space with our families in comfortable communities that make the journey bearable, and indeed enviable. The Galaxy has been the epitome of that. You'd barely miss Earth gone on some twenty-year mission into the depths of unexplored space. The same cannot be said of many other Trek ships where it usually seems like you'd quickly get a concussion on a poorly designed bulkhead or bedroom. Where the thought might return to you again and again that maybe you walk out that airlock....or fire a torpedo right back at your fascist little tin prison.
While TOS Enterprise was my first love—my appreciation for the -D has only increased. Graceful and aqualinear without being swollen as so many designs are now. This says it all https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/science-fiction-cover-art.42779/page-6#post-665428
With regards to Trek specifically, I'd say it's gone both ways. Jefferies, Probert, Sternbach, and Drexler put a lot of thought into internals and systems, and their ships' external forms were still definitely works of art. Many of the more recent ships seem like they're mostly designed by "rule of cool" without much thought as to how it functions, even though their surface details are more complicated than ever.
If you look at some the thought put into the refit Enterprise and Enterprise-D, half of the incidents that happen on ship should not be possible, or at least the safety gear needed should be easy to find anywhere on the ship The NX-01 also has a lot of those features. Some not as advanced but they are there.
I'm immediately reminded of the fan-made Ships of the Star Fleet article, "is the Galaxy class a failure?" owing to the number of ships lost and often preventable circumstances.
Only the Enterprise-D loss was silly and avoidable (and ultimately reversed, hurrah). The Yamato was destroyed by Iconian computer code, which could have taken out any other ship. It is only sheer luck that the Enterprise-D and the Romulan Warbird Haakona didn't go the same way. The Odyssey was destroyed by the Jem'Hadar specifically to show that the Dominion weren't messing about and were a real threat, and it took a hell of a lot of punishment before half of its secondary hull was destroyed by a kamikaze attack. Again, any other ship would have been taken out the same way. We know of no other Galaxy-class starship losses. Of all the ships we see being destroyed during the Dominion War, we do not see a single Galaxy (apart from the aforementioned Odyssey).