Home is where the dock is

Has anyone else gotten the idea this is a modular station design, meant to be scaled up (or down) by rebuilding domes and adding extra modules to the hub? Earth's Spacedock in the time of TNG must have been much bigger than that of the original movies, since Picard's Enterprise had about the same size relation to it as Kirk's did. But they were identical in appearance.

I know the real reason for that: the producers has to make ends meet, and using movie footage as a base for shots was a good way to save money. But what if long-term modular planning was the reason that base has so many domes? It starts small, and if needs demand it is 'grown' in phases:

A new 'cap' for The Mushroom is built atop the old one. That older dome is then disassembled, and a unit of station facilities is built around the stem's inner supports for it.