Reimagined: Yeager Class and Voyager's Premise

[nx1701g]

Imagine Janeway reclaiming a cargo bay to turn it into a hydroponics bay - even a ship the size of the Defiant must have a cargo bay - at the expense of cargo space

Defiant had one cargo bay according to dialogue in the 5th season.

forcing the surviving Starfleet crew to bunk up with members of the Maquis (instead of seemingly giving everyone their own rooms) which would be conducive to the Kim/Paris friendship and put an interesting spin on the inclusion of Neelix and Kes, who would have either had to bunk with other crew (Tuvok with Neelix would have been interesting, Kes presumably with either Samantha Wildman or B'Elanna).

They would've had to do that anyway if a Defiant had been used.

Voyager actually already having a kitchen always felt like a bit of a cop-out in retrospect, imagine them having to find the space to build a kitchen

Voyager didn't have a kitchen when it left spacedock. The kitchen was built by Neelix without authorization (In Caretaker the spot where Neelix's kitchen would soon be had a large bank of Replicators).

 

[tenmei]

Defiant had one cargo bay according to dialogue in the 5th season.

Right, thought it did - now imagine the possibilities of debate between the crew on whether they should get rid of that cargo space and use it as a hydroponics area or keep it as a cargo bay and not have the food that could be grown there.

They would've had to do that anyway if a Defiant had been used.

Which is exactly my point - that's something that would've happened on a smaller ship and it would have been conducive to storylines and characterisation.

Voyager didn't have a kitchen when it left spacedock. The kitchen was built by Neelix without authorization (In Caretaker the spot where Neelix's kitchen would soon be had a large bank of Replicators).

If memory serves right, the kitchen was actually the Captains Dining Room - and the same set for the Bellerophon (okay, it was the same set, just redressed) suggested that the option to convert it into a kitchen was avaliable to all Intrepid Class ships.