OpenGeofiction
I have been working on my country, Lallemand and Specifically Avewood for a full year now. I have learned new things in building my country and Southern capital region for nearly one year now. I made a lot of early mistakes and I’d like to thank OGF user’s in general for their ideas and specifically Luciano, isleno (My country flag) and histor for their help. Also above all BMSOUZA for helping me with the mess of a city I had when Avewood was first founded. (He helped me with my dozen Highway intersections around the city). I am currently working on the core of Avewood and still building more of it’s suburban sprawl and poor neighborhood’s. I would like some constructive criticism on what I need to fix, I am trying to make Avewood although a planned city like Abuja, More Africans on the outskirts and will be adding infill roads and building later. I also need to work on my inter-city rail, (about 60% of citizens are dirt poor, have informal economy jobs, and can’t afford a car so they walk . This explains why crime can drop so quickly neighborhood to neighborhood as criminals can’t afford cars and don’t know how to drive). North Novograd- http://opengeofiction.net/#map=14/14.5940/96.2121 Although non of the smaller streets are named here is an example of African-like build that I did in this section of the country. Avewood- http://opengeofiction.net/#map=14/13.9941/95.6576 The place with the rail station Old City will be the only place with African like build within the city, I will be using pedestrian roads to build this area. Westriver- http://opengeofiction.net/#map=14/13.8128/95.4075 New project of a rich exurban community of Avewood (Within one-two hour drive by highway), this city will be surrounded by poor suburbs of all major ethnicities- Ife, Ebibi and Ogbuefi Edo. Mbanta and other cities- http://opengeofiction.net/#map=14/13.8772/95.5281 Another African inspired city that is a suburb of Praetor Hills and Avewood, because commuters work there. This is different because multiple streets belong to an Estate so will have the same street name. Mostly dirt poor and lower middle class folk. Please give me tips on any of the above mentioned ideas or projects but would like if most tips were centered on Avewood city limits itself. Also here is a short wiki- http://opengeofiction.net/wiki/index.php/Avewood You can use this to judge which are the poorer neighborhoods and which are the richer neighborhoods based on crime and give tips on how to show a poorer neighborhood and a richer neighborhood. You can also use density numbers although they aren’t exactly accurate their probably close to the actual number.
Discussion
Comment from Leowezy on 30 November 2015 at 13:28
I’m obviously not an expert on African settlement structure, but perhaps you shoud reconsider the population density of 83,000 people/km² in Downtown Marina. Even if it’s very densely packed with highrises, this level of density would be very hard to achieve.
About Avewood in general; I’m not sure, but I think the car infrastructure seems too well developed for a city that is supposed to be mostly inhabited by poor, carless people. I don’t think many African cities would feature multiple highway belts.
On another note, I think you need to rework your railway lines in the old city in Avewood, currently they just meet in the middle like a star. I won’t be possible to construct a railway station there, especially considering that a multi-level station would be far too expensive for the city. I would guide one wide arrangement of tracks through the city centre to serve a central station, they can diverge a bit further outwards.
I really like your choice though, we already have heaps of “western” cities and countries on OGF, something completely different is a very nice addition :) I hope my comment helps, it’s just some loose stuff that caught my eye.
Comment from Portopolis on 30 November 2015 at 15:48
Thanks, it helps - Avewood is supposed to be my Hybrid city as most of my cities already have lack of large highways relative to population. Avewood is kind of like Africa in the future mixed with personal influences (Living in America and Houston, Texas, loops just seem the norm (Houston is currently working on world’s biggest loop). For this population density at first I thought it was ridiculously high but then I thought what would happen if ridiculously poor people who had lots of babies and usually lived in low rises (mixed with High rises, and then I thought of Manila, Philippines (The point is most blocks would be high rises of middle class, Lallemand Standards to people living in small apartments with lots of kids and a bunch of poor people in the northern part of the district.)Downtown-Marina isn’t as much a downtown as it is a high density residential area. For example Lagos densest LGA (Local Government Area) is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajeromi-Ifelodun is 57,000 people per square km. and their are 10 or less 20 story buildings or higher in Lagos and 0 in the densest district. Imagine if highrises with small apartments and people who average 4-5 children would result in an even denser environment.
Comment from isleño on 30 November 2015 at 22:48
Great idea to ask for feedback. I can give two quick suggestions. Although they aren’t entirely centered on Avewood, they’re a lot more visible from a distance and would go a long way toward helping the overall picture feel more realistic:
First, I’d add detail to the coastline, both inside and outside of Avewood. The coasts have been modified slightly, but the straight lines and sharp corners of the original are still very visible. The coastline around Mmeri is great, for example, but the corners at Northend and Ndida Avewood seem really abrupt, compared to the extremely straight coastline between them. The river mouth at Westriver is another place where you have some really great coastline detail. Real coastlines can be very straight, of course, but they don’t turn suddenly from one straight segment to another (unless it’s artificial land, but that tends to be very expensive).
Second, I agree with Leowezy… there are a lot of motorways for a country that isn’t very wealthy. If it was up to me, I’d probably reclassify all motorways outside the Avewood area, from motorway to trunk road or even primary, except for maybe LM-4 from Avewood to Wakinlayo, and possibly the LM-5 from Avewood south to Tayewo Beach (since those are the next largest cities). I’d also delete the expensive ocean bridges and replace them with cheaper ferry routes. It’s very hard to imagine a country like this building a 40-km bridge across open ocean.
In any case, it’s nice to see this kind of seeking feedback and focusing on detailed improvement, and as always it’s great to have an African-influenced country as part of this world. If you have specific questions feel free to ask.
Cheers,
isleño
Comment from Sarepava on 4 December 2015 at 00:01
One small observation is that although poor people can’t afford cars, car crime would probably be something of a problem in the city. South Africa had in recent years a serious reputation for increasingly sophisticated carjacking, and in a country like Lallemand there’s probably a small elite with expensive autos that get targeted by (probably armed) gangs and smuggled abroad, along with the drugs trade that this funds.
Personally I second Isleno’s advice to ‘dress down’ the city and remove the expensive infrastructure. I think even if this is a version of Africa in the future there will still be some significant level of poverty and older, disorganised layout. Perhaps some foreign country is improving things in return for getting access to oil and minerals, like China, so there are some nicer roads under construction and some new railways.
Comment from Portopolis on 4 December 2015 at 01:57
It is inspired by Africa, but it is still different. Although Lallemand is relatively poor my poor to rich formula is still 60% Poor, 30% Middle Class and 10% Rich. My country of Lallemand also doesn’t have many guns or kitchen knives. So besides leftover guns from the Pagbo Wars (Under War in the Wiki) Lallemanyans are generally a gun-less society. Also my nation is only 65% Traditional ethnic groups, so as much as 35% of its citizens are foreigners, either Ingerish who colonized early, or a host of Khaiwoonese, Hopponese, Gobrassanyan, Suvumese etc. peoples. Like I said most of the infrastructure besides cities like Akra City and the Wakinlayo-Surulere-Akinlere conglomeration was built by foreigners, and their isn’t as much racial stigma as current day SA, for example poverty is pretty uniform in that it affects all races the only thing is it is slightly skewed towards the Pagbo ethnic group in that 98% of Pagbos are poor while Yorugbos which are my largest ethnicity it is raised from 60% across all groups to maybe 75%. Also many of my poor live in rural areas and the Wakinlayo-Surulere-Akinlere region is the only urban area that is abysmally poor (90%). Since my island is small it effectively acts as one metro area. This is why the infrastructure seems really good in Avewood because Avewood is planned and acts like the central business district of a large Metro Area. For Example people commute to Avewood from my two rich suburbs of Kambaya and Westriver and although their not included in the Avewood metro their effectilvely suburbs this allows me to put nearly all my poor people in two areas, One- The Orisha Mountains and small towns outside of Avewood metro with the exception of Kambaya/ Westriver/ and parts of Tayewo Beach/ Two- the North Island Countryside (How am I going to feed a huge population/ with a small island lots of small farms and I even plan for a large Agricultural skyscraper in Tayewo Beach that feeds 15% of the city), Three Wakinlayo-Surulere-Akinlere this tri city area which may add up to nearly 5 million people is going to contain the vast majority of poor people with only about 500,000 or less living a relatively “middle class” life.
Sorry, for the rant/ long post. I was thinking of dressing Avewood down a little but since Avewood is literally the money maker and the most important and most invested city on the Democratic side of my nation (Half my nation has a communist party after a war partially split the nation into two areas) while most other places are ignored and considered dangerous even in their safe areas, I put most of my countries infrastructure in Avewood while building infrastructure for a 10th of the population in my other cities (Wakinlayo a city of 1.8 million literally has one highway loop where everything in it is rich and everything out of it is poor besides Kambaya. Also a tri-city region of 5 million has 2 highways, not even Kano or Ibadan only have 2 highways and no city over 5 million only has 2 highways. Avewood is Africa’s future optimistically and benefits from a stable government being very naturally urban and dense, but also very safe (in the tourist areas) which attracts tourists, having a blend of North Ulethan/South Ulethan architecture, being completely planned except for two- three small areas in it’s metro. Having most of the poor people living in mostly hidden dense and abismally poor neighborhoods, away from th, becaUSe city center and away from the glitz of the city center.
About the carjacking thing- Good Idea but since cars aren’t readily available unless criminals basically walk the good 5 miles into the car-rich area to try to steal a car with a knife. Also most criminals don’t know their poor and aren’t fighting to become rich but fighting for their gangs (Like the U.S although many gangbangers are rich they often live in the ghetto) Carjacking isn’t popular because 1. most criminals can’t drive. 2. most criminals have only used trains or public transport. Most criminals don’t have access to books or a library or even TV so unless the criminals who barely ever walk south past the loops which act as a wall that stops criminals from crossing, (Avewood loops have very few interchanges and are characterized by being raised onto bridges as to avoid touching surface street traffic making them inaccessible unless you climb up one. Because of Lallemanyan tribal conditions often kids are expected to be taught by neighborhood elders or their parents, most criminals don’t deal drugs (they are legal in South and North Lallemand and the government effectively exports the drugs and have a monopoly on drug companies, this along with tourism is why Lallemand is often called the freest country on earth, Prostitution is legal in certain districts, all traditional Lallemanyan drugs are legal, their is little regulation on things (Often their isn’t any speed limit on a road but since their isn’t many cars due to the over-infrastructure in Lallemand, accidents aren’t as common, many roads outside of Avewood are dirt or badly paved.
Again really sorry for the long posts, basically my point is Look at the entire South Island as one city of 12 million+ people, and the Infrastructure seems rather scarce because the SI effectively acts as a metro of 1 million people.
Comment from alb120 on 4 December 2015 at 05:47
The complex and seemingly over-invested road system in Avenwood is supposed to also contrast against the northern part of the country. While the north part is supposed to be a communist enclave, it relies more on rails rather than highways, and has larger industrial complexes.
In contrast, the south is supposed to be more capitalist, with more reliance on large highways and a busy CBD , with the countries’ wealth concentrated in the capital.
It is supposed to be a seemingly over-complex highway system, because it is a way of showing the countries’ focus on the concentration of growth in the capital rather than in rural areas, investing in unnecessarily large infrastructure where rich people live, while neglecting the infrastructure of villages with dirt roads.
I do agree that the country should have a smaller population, considering an island of it’s size cannot sustain such a large metro area, however, the resources of the island are spread out thinly, since most people are poor.
The island is supposed to have a high productivity, since most of the agriculture is modernized and owned by wealthy companies. It also has a low consumption, since the poor people are very poor, and there are few rich people.
PS: I’m working on the north part of the country.
Thanks for the suggestions