It's also worth mentioning that the Prometheus Saucer's nacelles are dinky tiny! As such they may only be useful sustaining an existing warp speed, rather than initialising a jump to begin with (power curve spikes and all that). As such, this doesn't preclude the presence of internal FTL equipment in the E-D saucer, capable of ferrying the craft to safety across interstellar distances (IMO)
DATA: Message from the saucer module, sir. It will arrive here in fifty one minutes. I find it hard not to concur. LAFORGE: Yes, and I want you to take the saucer section and proceed immediately to Starbase 103. Shouldn't it be more like "different from season to season"? Looks to me like Season One (perhaps with Andrew Probert still aboard?) suggested saucer section warp capability that somehow got forgotten later because it was never precisely spelled out. Probably another good example why to take retcon canon with grains of salt because it doesn't always benefit continuity? Maybe the saucer section emergency warp system wasn't that reliable when used too often - could help to explain why we didn't see that many saucer-stardrive separations in later episodes. I'm not a botanist to answer that question (ask Sulu), but the arboretum of the TMP Enterprise also featured a blue glare. Bob
I always assumed anyway that the blue glare was to simulate sky for the benefit of the people recreating in the TMP arboretum, more so than the plants.
But the sky on planet Earth doesn't glow blue that intensely, otherwise we'd all walk around looking like Andorians! The windows of an Arboretum should emit the same type of "daylight" coloured light as most other windows on the ship, I would have thought.
Man, I so love that shot. Also, I used to think that was the engine room, because the warp mixer glows blue too. I rationalized the inside scenes by the windows having shutters. I ALSO thought the engine room should be in the centerline of the hull and connected to the (I didnt know what it was then) deflector. That's where all those blue lights took me.
Another possibility. BTW, in Force of Nature (an episode most would rather forget) the Enterprise coasts at warp-speed in order to get out of the rift, but the warp drive was, for the most part, powered down. So it's possible that the saucer section, after separation, as long as it could maintain some sort of minimal warp-bubble, could coast for a while before dropping out of warp, but maybe not perform any course-correction.
^This actually was brought up earlier, and personally I think it's the best compromise of the competing theories, considering that ultimately there's no answer that unifies all of the information available. At least not beyond "Whether the saucer has or does not have warp capability is dependent on whether the plot calls for it."
Why would an arboretum even have gigantic ceiling windows? Wouldn't a holographic ceiling to simulate a sky that also emits plant appropriate lighting make more sense? The blue lights are the saucer warp drive, it's the most logocal explanation.
In this case you might as well ask why to have an arboretum at all, because any holodeck could just substitute the whole thing. I'd believe that people in the 24th Century would still cherish the "real things", so if you wanted to walk between actual plants the sky should also have some kind of authenticity, even if the stars above were not the stars of home. The advantage of an arboretum, IMHO, is that you can meet fellow crew members there any time of the day without the need to make a holodeck reservation. If there were no other candidates for a warp drive location in the saucer section, I would agree. Bob
It's "logocal" to assume that the lights represent a Federation warp drive that's radically different in design (not to mention placement) from any we've seen before?