San Francisco: Never the same twice

True. I've driven past some places around town and swore it was new. But when I checked google street view, it was not only present but looks the same from before I even first lived here.

 

As resident of Alameda, just east of "The City", San Francisco is always changing. In fact, they have fights all the time over making the city into this one big corporate, tech hub versus actually giving the residents there a city they would call home. However, it's gotten so expensive to live there that everyone who would have lived there are pushing into the East Bay where I live, and pushing out the poor out of a traditional blue-collar community. And constantly, you have people bothering senior residents in the East Bay with offers to buy their homes. Quite the mess.

As for STAR TREK's depiction of San Francisco, considering that it is a key hub where Starfleet Command, Starfleet Academy AND the Federation HQ is located at, I can imagine that San Francisco Bay Area has basically become New York with multiple boroughs, mixed with a cleaner version of BLADE RUNNER. And the concept of building downward would be sound, if nothing else but to contain humanoid interaction with nature.

DSW

 

Alameda apparently doesn't exist anymore, or is difficult to find for people from the 23rd century when they're looking for wessels

 

Or Chekov was busy drinking vodka between classes during his Academy and didn't bother to remember the suburbs/cities around San Fransico...Mill Valley, Fremont, San Mateo, San Jose, Etc....

I'm pretty sure there are people who went to college in a city they didn't grow up in or close and never bothered to pay attention to names of places, towns around the metro area....

 

Flying over SF this weekend (I saw The Big Red Thing) I couldn't help but think "Roddenberry says this mostly be underground."

 

It's Alameda. People live there but no one goes there to do anything interesting.

 

I'm glad they didn't go that route.

Living underground would seem to be quite a drag.

Federation government buildings are in Paris.

 

I thought that Paris was the location of United Earth Government HQ, not Federation HQ. Has that changed?

 

Hey, all part of the charm, and island of itself, as it were. At least, we have the only IN 'N OUT burger place for miles around.

 

But you don't have a Culver's.

 

Not a diss. I have a nostalgic affection for Alameda, being stationed from 81-86 on a ship home-ported in the Bay Area.
But even in the 80s when I was there, it was nothing but a nice, quiet place to live. I only ever went there when my ship was moored at the NAS. Oh and to do my laundry, because it was cheaper and less crowded to do it off-base.
The point being that I was only aware of Alameda because the Navy took me there.
(And In-n-Out wasn't a thing until long after I was gone.)

 

I thought that was just the President's office since a Council meeting occurred in San Francisco.

 

I actually would like to see this concept to return. Maybe there are underground districts in San Francisco (and probably other cities on Earth) at least since the 23rd century.

We just didn't see them.

 

Many years ago, I found this fan-made map that includes several IRL & in-universe landmarks:

 

Speaking of Paris, we could also have a thread on that changing with every appearence.

It's been the location of the Federation President's office since ST6. You can see the Eiffel Tower behind the President.



And DS9 also has it in Paris.

 

No, it's the Federation.

In fact we actually have no idea which city is the seat of United Earth's government. It could be anywhere on Earth. Not even the litverse has mentioned it, that I'm aware of.

I posted a thread about it in the lit forum, you might want to watch it...

 

So, where is the Federation Council Chambers located, per ST4? Just want to keep my ST nerd credential valid.

 

Actually, there's some wiggle room on that.

In fact we don't exactly know for sure that it's the actual Federation Council we see meeting in ST IV. I mean, it probably is, but it could also be some kind of subcouncil. The litverse runs with that, they say that the council we see meeting in ST IV is the Federation Judiciary Council, convening to hear the charges against Admiral Kirk and his crew.

And besides, it seems clear that there simply aren't enough councillors in ST IV to be representative of the entire Federation. I mean, the Federation has hundreds of members, and in the film there are, what, a couple dozen people on that council? So I'm inclined to agree with the litverse, that it isn't the actual Federation Council we see in the film.

 

It's San Fransisco. It has the Franz Joseph seal on the building and everything.

I will mix my usual rule of "If TOS gets there first, go with TOS" with the acknowledgement that there are a lot of firsts in just a few scenes, not all of them terribly well thought out. Think of it: This was the last movie where the movies alone were the only voice of Star Trek. This was also the first time we'd ever heard of a Federation President. Who apparently presides personally over sessions concerning Starfleet personnel.

In TOS there was never an indication that the Federation was made up of hundreds of members. In TOS space was big and explored space was small. Journey to Babel was meant to be fairly representative.

I never noticed that the establishing shot of the building that says United Federation of Planets and presumably holds the council chambers does not have any Starfleet markings. Yet this is presumably the same building that holds the control center where we see Cartwright, Sarek, and the President later.

What's shocking about the council scenes is how dominated they are by Starfleet! Everyone is wearing a UFP pennant, but somewhere in the neighborhood of half of the people in those stands, human or otherwise, are wearing maroons! On the one hand, yes, they're discussing the Enterprise and Kirk. But it's also an audience for the Klingon ambassador to speak. (I think it's both a cost saving measure on costumes and a difficulty that Star Trek has to this day of showing anyone of meaning outside of Starfleet.)

Just think: a few months before poor Valeris was killed for seeing the Genesis report. Now the Federation council is letting the Klingon Ambassador play it on a big screen TV.

That's cool. "Vulcan Town" skeeves me out a bit. I don't remember where it was meant to be, but in the novel of The Search for Spock Uhura escapes to the Vulcan embassy. (McIntyre's books are gorgeous, but not what we would call "canon" in these later days.)

I was going to say something about Skywalker Ranch but then I see that they DO have Skywalker Div. on there.

 

Since the President is also the commander in chief of Starfleet, that's not surprising.

Perhaps not. But now we know it is.