How far was Bajor to Federation space?
- Thread starter Evil Ezri
- Start date
It's never really stated how far Bajor or Bajoran territory was from the Federation.
In the early seasons there were several references to the area being considered "the frontier" by Starfleet characters. That seems to indicate that Bajor was fairly far from Federation terrority but close enough to seek membership.
In later seasons, these references were dropped and the plots often had Starfleet and established Federation planets like Earth within a relative short travel distance.
Both could work. Bajor might have been just outside Federation terrority, like Mexico City is to the United States. "The frontier" could then be just an expression for anything outside the Federation.
In the early seasons there were several references to the area being considered "the frontier" by Starfleet characters. That seems to indicate that Bajor was fairly far from Federation terrority but close enough to seek membership.
In later seasons, these references were dropped and the plots often had Starfleet and established Federation planets like Earth within a relative short travel distance.
Both could work. Bajor might have been just outside Federation terrority, like Mexico City is to the United States. "The frontier" could then be just an expression for anything outside the Federation.
Did say how "far away" Bajor was from Federation space. Did not say they were in Federation space.
It looked to be they were close to Federation space during the 2370's and much distance from Federation space in the past.
Sorry - I thought I was answering this question:
Evil Ezri said:
The answer to that question is, yes, Bajor definitely "was away" from Federation space. How far, I don't know, but I think Admiral Shran has summarized the issue very well, way better than I could.
The non-canon book Star Charts lists Bajor at around 50 ly from Earth and just outside the area considered to be Federation space.
In the show we had no idea what the closest Federation planet was to DS9. We know that it took the Defiant 4 days to get to Earth, 2-3 days from Ajilion Prime and maybe 2-3 days from Starbase 375 (if the fleet left pretty much straight away and travelled in the most direct route).
In the show we had no idea what the closest Federation planet was to DS9. We know that it took the Defiant 4 days to get to Earth, 2-3 days from Ajilion Prime and maybe 2-3 days from Starbase 375 (if the fleet left pretty much straight away and travelled in the most direct route).
As they say down on the frontier of Mexico City - muchas gracias.
Not sure if this is kosher for the forum, but here is a link to a star trek galaxy map:
http://booredatwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/Star_trek_map2.jpg
http://booredatwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/Star_trek_map2.jpg
I don't know if that's kosher, either, but perhaps it counts as promotional work for the Star Charts book?
There were some maps visible onscreen in DS9, on which that linked map is based, but while those maps gave the location of Bajor, Cardassia and Ferenginar, plus some idea of distances, they never gave the location of Earth.
It's just guesswork that Earth would lie in the middle of the "hollow" suggested by those onscreen maps, a hollow of neutral space against Cardassian space, with its border at Bajor. The idea behind the interpretation is that Earth fought a war against Cardassia in the recent past, getting as far as Bajor, and then stopping because the fight would have gotten too bloody from that point on. But instead of conquering the former Cardassian territories and allies, it withdrew at the end of the war and left the space neutral.
The scale of the onscreen maps, plus a suggestion in the DS9 Technical Manual made by the same people who made the onscreen maps, resulted in Earth being about 50 lightyears away from Bajor in that linked Star Charts map. 50 ly is a rather plausible distance for a starship to cover in a week or so, like our heroes generally did in DS9 ("The Search", "Paradise Lost", "Defiant"). Not very far, but certainly at the frontier, because one can't get any farther in that direction... Not without a warfleet, at any rate.
Timo Saloniemi
There were some maps visible onscreen in DS9, on which that linked map is based, but while those maps gave the location of Bajor, Cardassia and Ferenginar, plus some idea of distances, they never gave the location of Earth.
It's just guesswork that Earth would lie in the middle of the "hollow" suggested by those onscreen maps, a hollow of neutral space against Cardassian space, with its border at Bajor. The idea behind the interpretation is that Earth fought a war against Cardassia in the recent past, getting as far as Bajor, and then stopping because the fight would have gotten too bloody from that point on. But instead of conquering the former Cardassian territories and allies, it withdrew at the end of the war and left the space neutral.
The scale of the onscreen maps, plus a suggestion in the DS9 Technical Manual made by the same people who made the onscreen maps, resulted in Earth being about 50 lightyears away from Bajor in that linked Star Charts map. 50 ly is a rather plausible distance for a starship to cover in a week or so, like our heroes generally did in DS9 ("The Search", "Paradise Lost", "Defiant"). Not very far, but certainly at the frontier, because one can't get any farther in that direction... Not without a warfleet, at any rate.
Timo Saloniemi
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