Families aboard the ship?

[Lance]

The original concept was the Enterprise embarking on a 10-20 year deep space voyage and so the idea of families aboard had some rationale to it. Indeed in some of the early episodes there are vague references to "a long voyage ahead" and "our path lies outward" or something to that effect. But the moment they started having family members (like Llwaxana Troi) and others visiting aboard and having the ship return to Earth so easily the families concept was completely undermined.

In Conspiracy, Starfleet seems surprised to see the Enterprise in the Sol system, and they make a big deal out of the fact that the ship has returned to Earth, well outside of it's mission parameters. Which sits uneasily with the later seasons, where it seemed like the Enterprise was always coming home to Earth, and it's mission seemed to see it spending most of it's time within already well explored areas (Romulan and Klingon borders) rather than "exploring strange new worlds".

Of course, an in-universe explanation would probably be that the ship's mission parameters changed. Perhaps when the Romulans came out of retirement at the end of S1, Starfleet figured that they should reprioritise and make sure they kept the fleet fairly close to UFP home base.

 

[Timo]

In Conspiracy, Starfleet seems surprised to see the Enterprise in the Sol system, and they make a big deal out of the fact that the ship has returned to Earth, well outside of it's mission parameters.

In "Conspiracy", it was an important plot point that the ship returned without permission and without informing Starfleet of the intent - no doubt an unheard-of event!

Even later on, returning to Earth was somewhat rare, but the ship frequently visited other Federation ports that would have been "civilized" enough to remove isolation as a factor in necessitating the onboard families. And the idea that the E-D would be isolated from the UFP seemed to be abandoned almost immediately: there was no great plunge into the unknown after "Encounter at Farpoint", but rather a series of missions to locations already visited by other starships, plus a series of modifications to the ship with the help of Starfleet facilities and visiting experts. And none of that appeared to be unplanned or exceptional. Indeed, Picard time and again spoke of the first year as a test ride of sorts for the brand new starship, and commented on her various teething troubles which often necessitated maintenance by UFP assets.

Either the mission suggested in "Farpoint" was all empty talk - or then Starfleet read Picard's report on the Q encounter and decided that it would be a good idea to obey an omnipotent being and not go past Deneb IV after all. But either way, Picard should be thankful for this turn of events, as his ship obviously needed the support infrastructure of the UFP many times in the first season.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[PamalaLauren]

It almost seems like the writers needed civilians in the series in order to add to the draw of the show. Even in a show like Voyager where technically no civilians were on board they still brought in the "outsiders".

Did they feel that the crew of these ships weren't going to be able to carry the show without some inclusion of non-crew? But why did it have to be civilians on board the ships to create these new story lines?

Of course they could have been trying to appeal to a wider audience, or produce this ideal belief of life where soldiers and families were never separated. Honestly though it made little sense. Even deep space exploration has it's risks. Why were they willing to risk children of all things?

Even the space stations were in danger.

For as peaceful as the 24th century was supposed to be, it sure was a hellish place to live for many.

 

[Vanyel]

The Federation was some 8,000 light years in size. Presumably that's length from it's two most distant points (pure speculation on my part). But we don't know it's volume. Just for arguments sake, lets assume that the Federation is on average 500 light years thick and 2000 across. That's 8,000 x 500 x 2,000 that would be 8,000,000,000 ly's in volume (That number is not correct because it assumes a simple geometric shape, a cube, and it disregards my assumption that 8,000 light years is from the two furthest points. But it should serve to illustrate my point.) I could imagine that a ship could easily spend decades inside Federation space exploring unknown worlds and seeking out new life and civilizations and going where none have gone before. Even at 800,000,000 or 8,000,000 light years there would be a lot of unexplored space.

It would make sense that ships would take the shortest route possible from one world to another, mostly straight lines with minor course corrections. Those routes would make an interstellar highway of sorts. Veering slightly off those "highways" could easily be unexplored space, a wilderness just waiting to be seen.

Currently on Earth, there are areas that have never been seen by human eyes. Space is much bigger so I think it's possible that the Enterprise or any other starship could be exploring the unknown inside the Federation.

 

[Holdfast]

It would make sense that ships would take the shortest route possible from one world to another, mostly straight lines with minor course corrections. Those routes would make an interstellar highway of sorts. Veering slightly off those "highways" could easily be unexplored space, a wilderness just waiting to be seen.

Currently on Earth, there are areas that have never been seen by human eyes. Space is much bigger so I think it's possible that the Enterprise or any other starship could be exploring the unknown inside the Federation.

I really like this interpretation. Innovative.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

Either the mission suggested in "Farpoint" was all empty talk - or then Starfleet read Picard's report on the Q encounter and decided that it would be a good idea to obey an omnipotent being and not go past Deneb IV after all.

Or Farpoint station (the likely support base for such a mission) turning into a giant space jelly fish and flying off might have put an end to the deep space mission before it began.