Observations on Janice Lester's isolation room

[Christopher]

There's at least 2 Engine Rooms on the ship - in The Naked Time Scotty calls out over the intercom: "Engineers, man your stations. Engine rooms, report. Cycling station, report. This will be an emergency restart of engines."
And I think it's reasonable to assume that there's one in each hull, or the crew would be really screwed if they ever had to separate the saucer!

I also don't think it's a stretch that they would be similar in appearance - they are both engineering control rooms after all and Starfleet does love its modular equipment! For example, those large wall consoles were seen in the Engine Room, Phaser Control and Auxiliary Control - why shouldn't other equipment have shared duties? The function of the large tube structure was never clearly defined, after all.

I don't think it's likely that the control rooms for warp engines and impulse engines would look alike. The very nature of the drive systems is extremely different, and impulse drives are rather simple in comparison. Presumably the impulse engine control room would be smaller and have different controls and readouts. Also, we know for a fact that the large structures in the middle of the engine room floor provide access to the dilithium crystals. It makes no sense that identical structures would be found in the impulse engineering room.

And let's look at the precedents of other starship designs. In ENT, the movies, TNG, VGR, etc., the impulse engines are always controlled from the same main engineering room as the warp engines. It stands to reason that if there are separate impulse control rooms, they're auxiliary facilities that don't get a lot of use. So there's no reason they'd be just as big as the main engine room.

 

[Mytran]

And the Starbase 11 computer center!

I knew there was one I'd missed, thanks!

I don't think it's likely that the control rooms for warp engines and impulse engines would look alike. The very nature of the drive systems is extremely different, and impulse drives are rather simple in comparison. Presumably the impulse engine control room would be smaller and have different controls and readouts. Also, we know for a fact that the large structures in the middle of the engine room floor provide access to the dilithium crystals. It makes no sense that identical structures would be found in the impulse engineering room.

And let's look at the precedents of other starship designs. In ENT, the movies, TNG, VGR, etc., the impulse engines are always controlled from the same main engineering room as the warp engines. It stands to reason that if there are separate impulse control rooms, they're auxiliary facilities that don't get a lot of use. So there's no reason they'd be just as big as the main engine room.

Well we did see two different versions of the Engine Room (one single storey, one 2-storey) and the buttons on the control consoles changed often. The large power unit thingies would appear or dissappear depending on the needs of the plot and the double-triangular-doohicky in the middle of the room in Season Two suddenly manifested a dilithium crystal hatch in Season Three.
Was this the same Engine Room, undergoing structural and electronic changes on a frequent basis, or were we seeing different facilities which performed similar functions, perhaps acting as a reduncancy for one another?

I supose it depends on how literally you want to take the sets as presented onscreen - although if we take them at face value then we must accept that the Briefing Room, Rec Room, Chapel, Life Support and others are all the same size and all have identical angled wall struts. Not impossible, I suppose...

 

[Christopher]

I supose it depends on how literally you want to take the sets as presented onscreen - although if we take them at face value then we must accept that the Briefing Room, Rec Room, Chapel, Life Support and others are all the same size and all have identical angled wall struts. Not impossible, I suppose...

Given how differently TOS/TAS, the movies, and the Secret Hideout shows have interpreted 23rd-century tech, I think it's best to assume that we're seeing differing artistic interpretations of the same things. I mean, SNW: "A Quality of Mercy" was meant to show how "Balance of Terror" would have played out with Pike instead of Kirk, but it used the SNW bridge set and uniforms, as well as different Romulan makeup and ship designs. That would seem to confirm that we're seeing the same bridge "played" by different soundstage sets, just as Spock or Uhura is the same person played by different actors.

Granted, though, SNW's engineering set is too completely unlike TOS's for me to take it as a different interpretation of the same set. I presume there was a refit in between. But the various presentations of the engine room in TOS were probably just a TV production refining its set design as it went.