Starship Museums: why?

[Ray Hardgrit]

We don't typically see Starfleet vessels as big as Spacedock flying around in the 24th/25th century, but other factions have them. Borg Cubes, the Xindi Planet Killer, the Voth City-Ship, the ISS Charon, the Narada, plus there's V'Ger and the Whale Probe. This doesn't mean that Spacedock is equipped with a warp drive in case of emergencies, I'm pretty sure its designers intended it to stay put, but at worst getting it moving would've been an engineering challenge. In fact, they've shown California-class ships use their oversized warp drives to tow some ridiculously huge vessels, like an ancient generation ship and an Orion destroyer, so as long as the structure could take the strain this seems well within Starfleet's established capabilities.

 

[Ssosmcin]

It's 20 years from TOS to TSFS, and we know Pike had the ship for 10 years before Kirk thanks to "The Menagerie," so the ship is 30 years old, 40 if you count TAS. As of 1984.

Harve Bennett was probably counting the 5 year mission plus the time since the refit, which was left vague.

And in 1984, they weren't counting TAS.

He also probably left Pike out entirely simply because he didn't think of him or just wanted to simplify. If he said 40 years, you'd have literal minded super-fans being serviced but average film-goers wondering what's up. So, 20. In-universe, with the differences in the shooting model and crew size, it could have been a different vessel. They just didn't start slapping A's and B's on them yet (which I always hated anyway).

And considering the amount of space battles, giant green space hands energy barriers, asteroid fields, space clouds, giant amoeba's, and ion storms they encounter, not to mention the stresses of warp travel and so on, they get a lot more wear and tear than your car or an aircraft carrier sitting in the water off the coast of someplace launching jets and firing long range missiles. 20 years of that crap? I'd want a new ship too.

A ... reference to the age of the franchise.

The 20 year thing is off by two years - one if you go by the filming of the pilots and I'm not 100% convinced that Bennett - even with his dedication - was drilling down to the pre-production dates here. Especially since Kirk and Khan were reunited after "15 years" and this movie takes place a short time after the previous film. In universe time doesn't have to match the real world. If it did, years would pass between his films instead of days and weeks.

Bennett simply needed a narrative and, I assume, bureaucratic reason for Starfleet to mothball the Enterprise. It plays up the previous film's storyline of aging, gives Kirk a less than ideal ship to put into a crisis and then gives the old girl the opportunity to go out in a literal blaze of glory. At the same time, setting up the series for a new ship.

TL;DR: Star Trek set that precedent in 1984: 20 years being as okay point to retire a starship.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

Why would it be "Space Wizards"? They have the technology to move large objects from place to place. Nobody cast a spell or opened a portal. It either moved under its own power or was towed using forcefields and tractor beams. Very SF

When technology lacks limitations, it has become space magic.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

Why are all cultures equal?

This has got to do with my question? I asked that if Spacedock can be moved, why not Terok Nor and Empok Nor? This question does not suggest all cultures equal.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

How? It's an object in space. It's not physically tied to one place. And as I mentioned, it can be towed by starships. Nothing about Star Trek's tech says this is impossible.

Equipment and facilities get abandoned by retreating forces all of the time. Often because of the time table involved. The Armistice may have even requested that certain facilities be left for the Bajorans to use.

#1 Planets are objects in space too, doesn't mean they can be moved with warp drive.
#2 It kind of is in that the Spacedock is so huge, it is quite literally a space city, and it was built with Earth orbit in mind.
#3 It can be towed by starships, because bad writing said so.
#4 "Star Trek's tech doesn't say this is impossible," maybe so, but this is bad writing.
#5 It would be far more realistic for Spacedock to have been gently moved to orbit another planet in the Sol System or to orbit the star rather than a planet or moon. Warping it off to another solar system is just stupid.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

They may have dismantled part of it and then reassembled it. Nothing says they towed it to the new system in a single piece.

I don't think it was built with this in mind.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

I don't really like the fleet museum in Picard. I feel like they stuffed it full of way too many hero ships for the size of it, but I find a lot the shows have problems with scale and time. It seems so empty, like surely it's a tourist attraction but where the hell are people? Was the museum closed? Does Picard take place on the weekend? I would rather Defiant still be at DS9. Hell I wanted Voyager itself to still be flying around. I like that Spacedock didn't get recycled and thrown in a bin, I guess. I like that I could put a face to the Fleet Museum from the original version of "All Good Things," where Picard, Data and Geordi steal the Enterprise-D from the middle of an exhibit to go to the Neutral Zone.

I think it would have been much better if the Spacedock we see in PIC S3 were simply the original but upgraded. I was fine with the fleet museum. Just have it be "another" spacedock-like space station. Here's Memory Alpha's page for the Fleet Museum, it looks like the idea is to have a one Starfleet ship per class, which I can buy, but why have two Akira-class ships?

I get why Voyager is there, flew home from the DQ, it's a PR thing. Why is the Defiant-A there? Can't think of a good reason. If the Ent-D can go up against the Borg again with a crew of 7 and remain in service for a year until the Titan-A is renamed Ent-G, why retire the Ent-D? Just keep it in service.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

We don't typically see Starfleet vessels as big as Spacedock flying around in the 24th/25th century, but other factions have them. Borg Cubes, the Xindi Planet Killer, the Voth City-Ship, the ISS Charon, the Narada, plus there's V'Ger and the Whale Probe. This doesn't mean that Spacedock is equipped with a warp drive in case of emergencies, I'm pretty sure its designers intended it to stay put, but at worst getting it moving would've been an engineering challenge. In fact, they've shown California-class ships use their oversized warp drives to tow some ridiculously huge vessels, like an ancient generation ship and an Orion destroyer, so as long as the structure could take the strain this seems well within Starfleet's established capabilities.

In DS9's premiere, I seem to remember that the space station nearly tore itself apart just trying to move across the solar system.

 

[fireproof78]

This has got to do with my question? I asked that if Spacedock can be moved, why not Terok Nor and Empok Nor? This question does not suggest all cultures equal.

It has everything to do with it. That because Starfleet and the Federation cam then the Cardassians must also be able to.

Which is a stretch.

Why is the Defiant-A there?

Also PR. Per dialog, Starfleet doesn't build warships.

 

[Nerys Myk]

#1 Planets are objects in space too, doesn't mean they can be moved with warp drive.
#2 It kind of is in that the Spacedock is so huge, it is quite literally a space city, and it was built with Earth orbit in mind.
#3 It can be towed by starships, because bad writing said so.
#4 "Star Trek's tech doesn't say this is impossible," maybe so, but this is bad writing.
#5 It would be far more realistic for Spacedock to have been gently moved to orbit another planet in the Sol System or to orbit the star rather than a planet or moon. Warping it off to another solar system is just stupid.

1 & 2 a bit of a leap from space station to planet. Very different things. IIRC , we have starships moving objects like asteroids. Which are much closer in size to the space dock than a planet.
3 The Enterprise is also a city in space. While space dock might primarily be designed for planetary orbit, nothing precludes it also being movable by various means.
4 “Bad writing “ doesn’t mean “things I don’t like” or “stuff I never thought of “.
5 How are we defining “realistic” here? Possible within the level of technology seen in the franchise? If so, then yes it is “realistic “.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

It has everything to do with it. That because Starfleet and the Federation cam then the Cardassians must also be able to.

Which is a stretch.



Also PR. Per dialog, Starfleet doesn't build warships.

I was more arguing: either a space station is movable or not.
Starfleet does build warships. Watch FC, DS9, VOY...

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

1 & 2 a bit of a leap from space station to planet. Very different things. IIRC , we have starships moving objects like asteroids. Which are much closer in size to the space dock than a planet.
3 The Enterprise is also a city in space. While space dock might primarily be designed for planetary orbit, nothing precludes it also being movable by various means.
4 “Bad writing “ doesn’t mean “things I don’t like” or “stuff I never thought of “.
5 How are we defining “realistic” here? Possible within the level of technology seen in the franchise? If so, then yes it is “realistic “.

#1 When did a starship move an asteroid the size of Spacedock?
#2 The Enterprise is a starship. "City in space" was a reference to design, not internal function.
#3 Bad writing means, "this thing can happen because the writer said so" without taking into account realism.
#4 Realistic: a starship can go to warp, because it was designed to do so.
Unrealistic: a spacedock cannot go to warp, because it has no warp engines, and it would likely sheer apart from the stress of trying to move it.

 

[HotRod]

I'm the last person to defend the writing from Picard season 3, but I fail to see the issue with moving Spacedock. We've seen that things can be towed while at warp, so the station was probably towed by a number of Starships or tugs, which extended their warp fields and structural integrity fields around the station and brought it to its new location. Simple. Done.

 

[Nerys Myk]

#1 When did a starship move an asteroid the size of Spacedock?
#2 The Enterprise is a starship. "City in space" was a reference to design, not internal function.
#3 Bad writing means, "this thing can happen because the writer said so" without taking into account realism.
#4 Realistic: a starship can go to warp, because it was designed to do so.
Unrealistic: a spacedock cannot go to warp, because it has no warp engines, and it would likely sheer apart from the stress of trying to move it.

1 "Paradise Syndrome" The Enterprise attempts to use deflectors to move an asteroid the size of the Moon.

2 It's "internal function" was to be a city in space. With families on board and a mission profile that took it away from Federation space. A "city in space" can be anywhere: A ship, an asteroid, a space station and a space dock.

3 90% of what a piece of Trek Tech can do comes from a writer saying so. What it can't do also comes from a writer saying so. So to prove moving space dock is "unrealistic" you'd have to find supporting dialog in Star Trek.
Trek tech includes force fields, tractor beams and warp bubbles. We see large warp powered objects like Borg Cubes and First Federation Starships. We know Starfleet builds thing modularly. Coupled with the fact Space Dock was moved, it's very "realistic".

4 The design specs of Space Dock are unknown. What it can and can do are unknown until it does it. It very well may have a warp drive. It very well may have the shielding and internal structure to travel at warp speed. It may be able to be broken down into various components (The cap, the stem and the power core) and transported in pieces to be reassembled at a new location. So you can't say with certainty what the "realistic" abilities of Space Dock are.

 

[fireproof78]

I was more arguing: either a space station is movable or not.
Starfleet does build warships. Watch FC, DS9, VOY...

But that's a limit we don't know. We simply don't know. It's assumption that it can't.

I'm going off of dialog. From "The Search":
SISKO: Officially, it's classified as an escort vessel. Unofficially, the Defiant's a warship. Nothing more, nothing less.
Kira: I thought Starfleet didn't believe in warships.

 

[Ray Hardgrit]

In DS9's premiere, I seem to remember that the space station nearly tore itself apart just trying to move across the solar system.

That was due to instabilities in the subspace field they'd created to lower the inertial mass, and once they redirected more power to the deflectors it was fine. It's like how a warp bubble protects a ship from the harsher side of physics when it goes faster than light, to the point where people can be outside on the hull and hold on. If Starfleet had applied enough resources to the problem, I'm sure they could've established a warp bubble big enough to give even Spacedock a smooth ride, even if it's not designed to take the same stresses that a starship is built for.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

That was due to instabilities in the subspace field they'd created to lower the inertial mass, and once they redirected more power to the deflectors it was fine. It's like how a warp bubble protects a ship from the harsher side of physics when it goes faster than light, to the point where people can be outside on the hull and hold on. If Starfleet had applied enough resources to the problem, I'm sure they could've established a warp bubble big enough to give even Spacedock a smooth ride, even if it's not designed to take the same stresses that a starship is built for.

My take is, a STARSHIP can go to warp, because it's designed for that. A Spacedock and a Cardassian space station were never designed to be flown at warp from one solar system to the next as far as we know. This is where my objections come from.

 

[Nerys Myk]

My take is, a STARSHIP can go to warp, because it's designed for that. A Spacedock and a Cardassian space station were never designed to be flown at warp from one solar system to the next as far as we know. This is where my objections come from.

We now know that they can be moved from one solar systems to another. Only the method is unknown to us.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

1 "Paradise Syndrome" The Enterprise attempts to use deflectors to move an asteroid the size of the Moon.

2 It's "internal function" was to be a city in space. With families on board and a mission profile that took it away from Federation space. A "city in space" can be anywhere: A ship, an asteroid, a space station and a space dock.

3 90% of what a piece of Trek Tech can do comes from a writer saying so. What it can't do also comes from a writer saying so. So to prove moving space dock is "unrealistic" you'd have to find supporting dialog in Star Trek.
Trek tech includes force fields, tractor beams and warp bubbles. We see large warp powered objects like Borg Cubes and First Federation Starships. We know Starfleet builds thing modularly. Coupled with the fact Space Dock was moved, it's very "realistic".

4 The design specs of Space Dock are unknown. What it can and can do are unknown until it does it. It very well may have a warp drive. It very well may have the shielding and internal structure to travel at warp speed. It may be able to be broken down into various components (The cap, the stem and the power core) and transported in pieces to be reassembled at a new location. So you can't say with certainty what the "realistic" abilities of Space Dock are.

#1 Starships being capable of such a feat, is this consistent across the franchise, or was this a one-episode thing, because 60's continuity not important?

#2 Families and mission profile flying away from Federation space: does this not describe virtually any deep-space exploration ship?

#3 Since Spacedock popped up in TSFS, it and the other Spacedock-like space stations have always been these massive space stations, cities in space. When you can zap it to another solar system, it's reduced to cheap CGI. A Borg Cube is built with warp and transwarp in mind. A spacedock is not.

#4 If they wanted it to be relocatable, they'd have designed it to include a warp drive.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

But that's a limit we don't know. We simply don't know. It's assumption that it can't.

I'm going off of dialog. From "The Search":
SISKO: Officially, it's classified as an escort vessel. Unofficially, the Defiant's a warship. Nothing more, nothing less.
Kira: I thought Starfleet didn't believe in warships.

Not believing in is not the same as not having. Bob might not believe in guns, but he sure as hell will use one to protect his wife and kids from a serial killer. See what I mean?