Not everything in the United Federation of Planets is under Starfleet control, although
it may seem like that to viewers of the shows. This is simply because the shows primarily
follow Starfleet personal on starships star trekking across the stars. But it isn’t
the only way to travel. Hi Ric here today and we’re looking at the alternates within
the UFP that provide interstellar transport. One of the biggest presences that the Federation
has outside of Starfleet in space is its extensive network of Cargo ships. Money between federation
worlds is an absent concept and replicators can create a number of materials and devices
for colonies and citizens. However, this does not create a truly “want for nothing”
society. Some materials, such as dilithium or latinum cannot be replicated and have a
number of uses and for many original material goods are preferable to replicated ones. The
trade of foodstuffs for example is still commonplace with many agricultural worlds electing to
grow their own crops or raise their own cattle when they can and perhaps share these resources.
The Earth Cargo Service has existed since before even the United Federation of Planets
and as it operates from one of the core worlds of the organization, remains one of the chief
conveyers of material goods outside of Starfleet. They operate a fleet of cargo vessels to which
independent captains and crews register their services.
Such ships are predominantly cargo vessels, obviously being the most efficient at transport
and the early days of Earth’s interstellar voyages, they were often limited in the speed
and armaments capacity, a trend that continues into the 24th century. This is because it
was institutions like Starfleet that were pioneering most starship technology and so
the benefits were slower to make their way to civilian sectors.
Cargo vessels therefore would undertake month long voyages at low warp hauling whatever
supplies they were contracted to take. As such, crews aboard these vessels tended to
be much closer-knit than those on Starfleet vessels as these crews were seldom rotated
out and a ship often became a home while cargo, a family business. One such freighter was
the ECS Horizon operated by the Mayweather family in the 22nd century. Originally these
vessels operated to service Earth and her colony worlds but as humanity’s reach grew,
they too adopted a wider client base. The Earth Cargo Service is not the only option
either, many smaller ventures have opened up such as Kassidy Yates Interstellar Freights,
which is a small operation run in Bajor and neighbouring sectors as well as Earth. It’s
headed by Kassidy Yates-Sisko and as of 2399, is still flourishing having originally only
had a single vessel, the SS Xhosa, part of the Bajoran Ministry of Commerce. Starfleet
did manage its own transport sector too and made us of ships such as the Wallenberg-Class
was a Starfleet made tug to which cargo canisters could be affixed.
Away from transport, many scientific organisations operate their own research vessels outside
of Starfleet control. Although frequently researchers operate in cohort with Starfleet
due to the nature of the exploratory organisation, its vast resources and connections to other
political, scientific or diplomatic entities. A good example of this Starfleet cooperation
lay in the 2260s era Starship the USS Intrepid. This constitution class vessel was on extended
loan the Vulcan Science Academy and operated a completely Vulcan crew. This shows a huge
commitment from Starfleet to the Vulcans and I doubt that such a hefty loan would be given
to a species that wasn’t a founding member, but unfortunately this vessel was lost to
a giant space-bacterium. Another tale is that of the USS Raven NAR-32450,
a specialised, Starfleet constructed science vessel, that was given over to Magnus and
Erin Hansen in 2354 to investigate claims of a cybernetic race spotted deep in the Beta
Quadrant. This vessel, although constructed by Starfleet was under Federation jurisdiction,
and civilian operation. However it disobeyed Federation orders and crossed into the neutral
zone before being swept up by a Borg Transwarp corridor and being deposited in the Delta
Quadrant. Nonetheless, there are many organisations
which operated in cohort with Starfleet to conduct scientific studies or to ferry colonists
so if you’re motivation aligned with Starfleet’s mission parameters, then they would be a go-to
choice as temporary custodians of your persons and belongings. Such examples are too numerous
to mention, but we do see this frequently in TNG with the Enterprise itself acting as
eager host to several scientific minds and their personal missions or providing a new
colony world with materials and members. In fact, there are several types of Starfleet
vessel designed exclusively for these sorts of duties. The infamous Oberth-class was basically
a science lab with a warp drive and several of these even ended up in use by organisations
outside of Starfleet such as the SS Vico NAR-18834. There are also simply passenger ships or “starliners”
as they are sometimes called. These are vessels that simply run passengers between systems
much as a public transport between cities. Such vessels ran across established routes
throughout Federation space and beyond but the exact relation between the federation
and these entities us unclear. One would suspect that they are mostly independent ventures,
perhaps affiliated with the worlds to which they operate, but there are records of Starfleet
owned liners such as the USS Constantinople which was classified as a passenger liner.
Another source of interstellar vehicles not part of Starfleet would be from member world’s
own military or pre-Federation forces. Remember, just because a planet joins the Federation,
does not mean it loses its government and associated institutes so while some aspects
are merged into Starfleet, many remain independent and under the sole ownership of a world’s
own forces. This goes double for a member worlds own commerce sectors, they just have
to adapt to the currency-less framework of the Federation.
Colony planets too often had their own ships for transport and defence. Such ships included
the Erewon-class SS Santa Maria BDR-529 which, again, was constructed by a Federation-allied
facility but was not a Starfleet vessel. Finally there are those who are simply Federation
citizens and own their own Starships. Independent Ship owners are common throughout all the
quadrants and systems and each has their own reasons for flying. How they acquire a vessel
is still up for speculation as money does not change hands and quite how the economy
of such a system works is tactfully avoided. You could always acquire or build your own
craft too, but again, how these privately owned ships end up in the hands of someone
who wants them is a bit of a mystery with no real “purchase” option in the Federation.
As you’ve no doubt noticed, a frequent theme in these independent services is the exchange
of currency. Even though the Federation does not use money and UFP run liners only require
you book passage, other powers in the galaxy do use cash. Independent ship owners can travel
beyond the borders of UFP space and be protected by Federation citizen status. There are few
restrictions on who you can do business with so from what we’ve seen such independent
crews may require monetary compensation in some form if their travels take them beyond
the comparatively privileged Federation space. A good example of this is Captain Rios of
the La Sirena who takes payment from his charges depending on the location they need to be
couriered to. This money likely goes towards the upkeep of his vessel after all, I doubt
a Ferengi, or a garage on Freecloud would repair his ship for free.
One theme is also rather apparent. It is rather hard to completely avoid Starfleet and even
more so the Federation involvement if you live in their space, even if you’re not
a member world. Many of the ships built for interstellar travel tend to be made by a UFP
world using Starfleet technologies or even straight out of Starfleet itself, even if
they’ve relinquished ownership of the vessel. The reasoning for this is simple, one of the
founding principles of the Federation was mutual cooperation and a sharing of technology
and Starfleet makes a point to involve itself in the efforts of others to expand its capabilities.
This is done out of a desire to improve all, but it’s also not hard to interpret the
motivations as less pure and more controlling, especially as the non-Starfleet vessels tend
to be so underwhelming on a technological level, often being the target of pirates and
raids. Then again, Starfleet does also operate to protect these vessels, regardless of origin
and affiliation. In summary, if you wanted to travel between
worlds without Starfleet, there are options out there but you may even be required to
pay for it. As a Federation citizen, that might pose a problem unless you have some
privately owned capital, something to barter or can utilise whatever UFP created system
is in place for this sort of situation. Of course you could always claim to be a theoretical
physicist who has invented a new warp system to get the resources and all the travel you
need for free from Starfleet, but then they’d have a not-so-subtle say in the direction
of your work. In these cases, Starfleet has been known to turn over entire vessels to
Federation-allied science teams with the presumable caveat that any breakthroughs be shared, as
seen with the Intrepid and the Hansen family on the Raven.
Maybe I’ll do another video more focused on the scientific communities of the Federation,
but this about covers all the options you have for interstellar travel that I could
think of. If I’ve missed one, let me know but I think most options fit into one of these
categories. I do like how Starfleet could be interpreted as more meddlesome than its
moral motivations suggest, for example, if the Raven had encountered some friendly cyborgs
and not the Borg, do you really think Starfleet would have allowed the Hansens to retain control
over a first contact situation or would the Federation have assumed control and made the
scientists “advisors” to the process? I get it’s not supposed to be about personal
glory, but credit where credit’s due still a thing in Trek.
Anyway, before I go off on another tangent, I’ll end the video here. Thanks for watching
this breakdown on the various ways to traverse the Star Trek galaxy for your standard Federation
citizen and until the next sci-fi lore, discussion or gameplay video, I’ve been Ric, thanks
again for watching and goodbye!