Before the arrival of the Centauri in the 22nd century, humans were confined to their own solar system, forced to use slow sleeper ships to explore the universe. The Centauri offered the use of their "jumpgates" (portals into hyperspace) and later, taught how to make them. In exchange for this and other technologies, they asked only for trinkets, novelties to sell back home.

In the eighty years that followed, humanity flexed its muscles, expanding outward at a rapid pace. When a group of less powerful races was attacked by an invading army, Earth came to their aid, cementing its role as a major galactic power, if a young, brash one.

The wave of euphoria came crashing down when humanity made contact with a mysterious race called the Minbari. The Earth-Minbari War began with a misunderstanding, a human captain and a Minbari commander too quick on the trigger. Thanks to bad luck or something darker, the first meeting of humans with the Minbari resulted in the death of their supreme religious and political leader. To the Minbari, what followed was a holy war, vengeance for the murder of their spiritual leader. Earth forces were no match for the technologically superior Minbari, and were easily beaten back to their home planet.

Then, without explanation, as their ships closed in on Earth and wiped out the last desperate defenses, the Minbari halted their advance and surrendered. Only an elite few knew why.

The Babylon Project was conceived in the aftermath of the war. Modeled after the United Nations, it would be a meeting place, neutral ground where the powers could meet and work out their differences peacefully.

The first three Babylon stations were sabotaged in mid-construction. The fourth was completed, but just as it was about to go online, it vanished without a trace. The Earth government would have stopped there, but some of the alien governments, seeing the value of a meeting ground, offered financial assistance for the construction of a fifth station. Naturally, there were strings attached.

Babylon 5 is the last of the Babylon stations, the last hope for a galaxy without war. In the year 2257 Babylon 5 opened for business.

Five miles long, Babylon 5 is divided into separate, discrete sections that rotate at differing speeds to provide different gravities to accommodate those who come to the station.

By virtue of being patterned physically after the work of such scientists as Gerard K. O'Neill, the absolute center of the elongated station (which revolves to provide gravity) is a sort of hollow-world look, with fields and hydroponic gardens along the 360-degree circular section (which is about a half-mile, or a mile across)...and as you get closer to the absolute center, where a transport tube cuts from one end of the station to the other, naturally you get less and less gravity until you can literally hang suspended. This area is known as the Garden.

And there are living areas designed to accommodate different environments and atmospheres and conditions. The alien sectors are off-limits to humans without protection (breathing gear and other measures). Similarly, a heavy CO2 breather or methane breather would have to wear an encounter suit to travel among the humans on the station. In addition, the B-5 station is actually made up of several independent (though connected) sections, each revolving at a different speed in order to create alternative areas of gravity.

Some sections of the station, called the Downbelow, are inhabited by Babylon 5's equivalent of the homeless, called Lurkers. Most of them are people who came to the station looking for work; they didn't find any, and can't afford passage offstation. No government is willing to pay to ship them home (and in some cases, they wouldn't even be allowed home) so they languish on the station. The Downbelow is a center of criminal activity on B5, though by no means is crime confined to that area.

The Babylon 5 station isn't just floating there. It's at the L-5 point in a binary star system between a moon and Epsilon 3, a barren, lifeless planet.

• The "front" part of the leading sphere has the bay entry opening into the station's axis. It is flanked by two observation domes (the two "bridges")
• The Docking bay is a ringlike section around the equator of the leading sphere. Ships enter through the axis of the sphere and are "lowered" down into an empty slot in the bay
• The Cobra bays are on the three struts supporting the leading sphere
• The Med lab is a sphere shaped area snug against Blue Section
• The other sections are shaped like rings.
  • Blue section: Political officialdom
  • Red section: Business
  • Green section: Ambassadorial accommodations
  • Grey section: Exotic alien environments; industrial areas
  • Brown section: Slums and brothels
• The Garden is the hollow cylindrical area with hydroponic gardens. One often sees this in the open-air luxury restaurants
• The Core Shuttle runs down the station's axis

This information was put together from facts gathered from various sites if you know of a good B5 link please e-mail me and I will add it below.