| City Map | |
|---|---|
| Tweet Topic Started: Jul 25 2011, 12:24 AM (232 Views) | |
| Little Boy | Jul 25 2011, 12:24 AM Post #1 |
|
WOAH. HEY. YEAH. I'M STILL INVOLVED IN THIS. Basically, I felt it'd be a good idea to make a map of the city, and I would like to volunteer my services. I know we've got discussion on areas going on in specific topics, and that will most likely continue for awhile. Neighbourhoods and the linking of the neighbourhoods can come later. For now, maybe we could make an overall map of the city, without any neighbourhood markers? If we're going for a sorta Chicago/Detroit thang, which I garnered from several comments, maybe we could base it partly off one of those cities? |
![]() |
|
| Doghouse Reilly | Jul 25 2011, 01:21 AM Post #2 |
![]()
Somebody's always giving me guns.
|
A map would be very helpful. Public transportation would be important. An underground, maybe? Trolleys/cable cars? |
![]() |
|
| Anderson | Jul 26 2011, 12:57 AM Post #3 |
|
Some thoughts: There are basically two major settings possible: Rust Belt (NYC, Chicago, etc.) and Sun Belt (mainly LA/SF in this timeframe, but Florida could be a pick as well, with lots of unique intrigue to throw in with Latin America). They're not radically different, but there are some subtle differences: Rust Belt -The city will be more compact and older: You'll have lots of tenements in older parts of town, often in dilapidated housing that was once very nice (i.e. at the end of the 19th Century). -You'll quite possibly have a subway in a big enough city; you'll very likely have an El (that is, elevated railroad). -There will likely be a streetcar system, and in fact you may have two or more sets of lines owned by competitors (this was an eternal headache for commuters if they had to transfer between systems, since the lines often didn't honor the others' passes and so forth). -There may be a rudimentary expressway system of some sort, likely built in the 1930s. You had this sort of development in Boston, New York, and I believe Philadelphia...but not much beyond this until the 1950s. -There will probably be 2-3 major train stations: Most of the major RRs had their own terminals. Despite what The Untouchables implied, there were a half-dozen terminals in Chicago (Union Station was the largest, but the Illinois Central, New York Central, and a host of others had separate terminals); NYC had only two, but that's because about four major railroads terminated in Newark instead of tunneling under the Hudson. -There will probably be an airport, but most travel will still be by air at this point; this didn't turn over until the mid-1950s. -There will be suburbs after a fashion, but they'll be along commuter railroads (such as the Long Island Railroad or the network that became New Jersey Transit and Metro North). These will still be owned by a private corporation (Conrail was still running most commuter traffic in the NE until the 1980s, though NY State bought the LIRR much earlier). Sun Belt -The city will be fairly spread out. You'll still have slums (probably in a harbor district or a factory area, though farming-related slums are a possibility). The edges of town may still be transitioning from agriculture (let us not forget how much of the LA metro area was once orange groves). -There won't be a subway system; surface rail operations will dominate, as the cities are new and land is relatively cheap. This will include streetcars; it may include some sort of commuter RR operation. Also, the commuter rail lines will usually be owned by one of the major RRs (Southern Pacific owned a lot of the LA-area railroads); the streetcars will often be a separate system. -There won't be a preexisting expressway system of any sort. These really were exclusively a Northeastern thing until the postwar era (the population densities just weren't there until too close to the Depression), though plans might be in the mix for one, depending on the date. -You'll likely only have one or two RR stations: There was always less passenger traffic in the West than in the Northeast, and even in places like Miami operations tended to be a bit more consolidated (most of the RRs moved into LA Union Station in '39, for example); also, there were less RRs in many cities (again, lower densities and less industrialization). Still, Orlando (with about 50,000 people in 1950) had two RR stations. -An airport is likely, but again...it's going to be secondary to the train station. -You're not really going to have "suburbs": LA notwithstanding, the cities just aren't big enough to support them at this time: LA had about 2 million people at this time; after this, San Francisco had 775k; Houston about 600k; New Orleans 570k; Seattle just under 470k; and Dallas, Denver, and San Antonio in the low 400k range. For reference on some other big Sun Belt cities today: Atlanta had only 331k, Miami had only 250k, Tampa 125k, and Las Vegas didn't even make the top 100 list. You'll still have outlying areas, but for the most part it won't be the big, massive conurbations you see in the Rust Belt at this time. Pick a region (and be more specific if possible) and I'll offload a big dump of information and ideas to make things as realistic as possible. |
![]() |
|
| Anderson | Jul 26 2011, 05:00 AM Post #4 |
|
Rust Belt Setting, Midwest The City is located in the Midwestern United States. A reasonably major city, though not quite Chicago or New York, it has the benefit of being served by both the Pennsylvania Railroad and the New York Central Railroad: The former runs just south of downtown, while the latter runs just north of town; a pair of short lines connect the two systems and act as a bridge while both maintain substantial spurs into the industrial areas of town (primarily towards the eastern side of town, downwind of the city) to haul raw materials and coal in and then to take the finished products out to the greater American market. Both Penn Station (owned by the Pennsy and served almost exclusively by them) and Union Station (owned by the New York Central, but served by several other lines) are located in downtown, at opposite ends of the city center. From either station, one can board a train to New York or Chicago, and from there connect to any of a number of other destinations; direct travel is available to many other destinations as well, either directly or through connecting services. Within the city, an extensive network of streetcars is operated by the Interurban Transit Company. The lines, which radiate from downtown and criss-cross the city center, cover almost all of the suburbs save a few of the newest (where the increased use of the automobile has rendered extensions unprofitable). Perhaps the only drawback in the system is that occasionally, one must pass through the general downtown area to make a transfer to another line headed to one's destination, as linking lines in the suburbs have never been fleshed out as much as many might prefer and as such some trips can be rather roundabout. A small supplementary bus network exists in a few areas, but for the time being ITC has maintained a strong position in the city market. There is also a small system of commuter railroad services, with a pair of lines running north and south from town; these lines operate on the same track in downtown, forming the closest thing The City has to a subway as they pass under downtown, linking both Penn Station and Union Station with the commuter towns located along these lines. Though no expressways can be found in the city, a number of major roads pass through, with several major state highways forming thoroughfares in the city center. One can find a reliable paved road headed almost anywhere else if one so desires. Once one gets out of the city and the smaller commuter towns, however, most areas within the next fifty to a hundred miles are farming towns and the like: Rural middle America, largely nondescript, and still crossed in many areas by dirt roads alone once one deviates from the paved long distance highways (though improvements have been made since the 1920s, to be sure, many rural counties have yet to see more than a few scattered concrete slabs). Note: I can shift the railroads around to fit any setting...basically, there were major regional rivalries throughout the US. In New England, you'd have the NYC and the New Haven; in Florida, it would be the Atlantic Coast Line and the Seaboard Air Line; in California, Southern Pacific and Santa Fe. Most of the other details would be more or less the same, though the commuter rail would probably be dropped. For reference, "Union Station" simply indicated that several railroads had pooled their operations at one station; Penn Station was used for almost all of the Pennsy's stations, and other stations would be named after either a geographical landmark/street (i.e. LaSalle St. Station in Chicago) or the railroad owning them (i.e. Central Station for many of the Illinois Central and New York Central stations). Also, I kept things vague as I don't know where people want to go with the map...if I have a map, I can develop from there. |
![]() |
|
| 1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous) | |
| « Previous Topic · Worldbuilding · Next Topic » |







3:51 AM Jul 11