Urbanate

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The urbanate is an urban planning concept associated with Häverism. It is an assembly of buildings, in some cases even one large building, in which people would live and work. The urbanate shows a very technocratic approach to urbanisation and city life, where the physical environment was aimed at efficiency and providing the social basis for a Häverist society. Settlements built according to these principles are called urbanates as well. A similar approach was applied to the countryside, where agricultural production and food processing were organised in the form of agrinates.

History

The urbanate as a planning concept was developed separately from Häverism as a political ideology. During the age of industrialisation, the need for efficient and clean urban environments became more obvious, with several different concepts being developed and tested, like the industrial town, the garden city and the ABC city. The urbanate can be seen as a rather radical approach, where economic efficiency became the backbone of the planning concept, resulting in a clear breach towards traditional planning and urbanism.

As a planning concept, it gained popularity among socialists and Häverists. Pioneered by the then-revolutionary Häverist movement in Helreich, the urbanate was an ambitious project that aspired to redefine city living within the Häverist Commonhold from the late 7490's on. It was applied to new towns and rural settlements at first, creating a basis for Häverist society. Then existing cities were redeveloped with the concept as blueprint. It was part of the Häverist strategy to eradicate all physical memories of the previous aristocratic regimes, as well as to move the population into a built environment specifically designed for the Häverist lifestyle.

The urbanate was applied all over the Häverist Commonhold, including overseas territories in Altaia. But when Häverism evolved into Orderism, the rigid concept of the urbanate and agrinate were adapted to a more place- and time-adapted application. By the 7620's no more urbanates were built, while at the same time the renovation of many urbanates started. The densely built settlements proved to be extremely difficult to adapt to the new requirements of urban life in the 77th century.

Characteristics

Urbanates were designed to give each citizen the highest standard of living possible within a sustainable resource base. Each unit, whether a massive singular structure or a cluster of buildings, sought to merge residential, occupational, and leisure spaces. These units boasted of integrated facilities - schools, hospitals, shops, waste management systems, sports centers, and public realms such as parks and gardens. Furthermore, they were designed to ensure residents were never far from nature, providing effortless transitions to the countryside. Urbanates could be something akin to resorts, with all sorts of leisure facilities included. These structures would be built with a view to practicality and non commercial concerns, and protection of resources. Getting around in an urbanate should be inherently easy and efficient, with every kind of major facility placed within walking distance of a housing complex.

Within the Hellish application of the urbanate, many settlements were physically separated in segments. Since there was no need to leave the own sector for work, education or leisure, the Häverist authorities deemed internal mobility as unnecessary and inefficient. So these movements were made impossible. Many of the urbanates therefore didn't have a public transport system and weren't prepared for tram or metro systems. In overseas territories, this segmentation was used to separate quarters with Hellish settlers from areas where the local, native population was housed. This fitted the Häverist stratification of society, where different echelons were supposed to stay within their functional group of society.

Architectural marvels of the era

The creation of urbanates was a collective endeavour. Experts from various fields in Helreich — from engineers to architects and from industry managers to builders — all collaborated to turn this dream into reality. They developed two distinct design philosophies:

  1. Quadrilateral Designed Urbanates: Emblematic of the era's love for geometric structures, as showcased in Ayern.
  2. Circular Designed Urbanates: The design in Thronreich, which broke away from sharp edges, favouring flowing curves.

Every urbanate was a testament to the era's commitment to energy conservation and safety. Using advanced materials of the time, these buildings were crafted to be fire-resistant and were built to withstand the potential natural calamities known to Helreich. A distinguishing feature was their standardised design, made possible through the use of pre-fabricated materials, which marked a leap in construction efficiency.

Especially in Helreich, many urbanates and agrinates are still in use today. Neustadt am Rikh is a showcase of Häverist urbanism, which has hardly been altered during the last century. Bergheim was one of the earliest examples in Mörenburg and pretty much functional today. Rosenburg on the other hand was completely modernised after the Häverist onslaught on this historical city that dated back almost 1000 years. Eichenstadt is an example of an urbanate founded as a new town, flourishing after it got an underground metro system in the 7660's. Sammanhafen was constructed around the ports of the much older city of Dunkelheim, currently functioning as a dual city. Felsenberg's foundation as a mining town in Mörenburg was done as an urbanate, but much of it was demolished after the mines closed in the 7650's. Silberwald was the testing ground for the circular designa as applicated in a large scale in Thronreich a few years later. It is known for its three half circular apartment buildings surrounding the town core. Kronenthal was a typical post-imperal industrialising settlement that completely got remodeled under the new, more neutral name of Lindendorf.

But to most supporters of the Häverist form of urbanism, the radical approach of the urbanate in Scheinhofen is the most striking example with its 18 identical cross shaped apartment buildings in 16 stories is the most striking example. Built between 7568 and 7688, the crucifix shaped buildings hosed 2500-3000 people each, forming a small town sized community on their own. At its peak, Scheinhofen housed 50,000 people, mainly working in manufacturing on a ground level industrial estate measuring 6 km2. However, architectural critics have condemned the site as being unfit for social interactivity:

There is no relationship at all between buildings and site, neither at grade nor atop the podium, since all vestiges of the existing site have been so totally obliterated. Thus, as one stands on the central Platz, there is an eerie feeling of detachment."

Urbanate's impact

Urbanates were more than mere architectural novelties of their era. They epitomised a forward-thinking approach to urban living, integrating efficiency, safety, self-sufficiency, and a harmonious bond with nature. However, the latter proved to become a negative cost factor, where "nearby nature" often got replaced by urbanate extensions for a growing population and economic activity. The demand for economic efficiency often got in the way of the qualitative aspects of the urbanate, like "the highest standard of living possible" and "proximity to nature". Quite often, the urbanates in Helreich were deemed soulless places without any room for private initiative or unplanned activities.

On the other hand, the industrialised production method has led to dwelling plans and building techniques that have revolutionised residential planning and building even outside the Häverist sphere.

When Helreich started implementing the urbanate overseas, in territories like New Hapsburg, New South Gate and Schangtienrand, the segmented urbanates were applied in a way that the native population would end up in their own neighbourhoods. The main explanation was to safeguard local cultures and to give room for local production traditions within the Häverist setting. But it was obvious that building materials used in the native parts of town were inferior, as well as the density of educational, health and commercial services being much lower. The settlers' parts of the urbanate were clearly on a different level.

At first, the Hellish planners, architects and engineers also made the mistake of copying the concept from Helreich's temperate to subtropical climate to the Altaian mountain regions and tropical monsoon regions. There the challenges of creating a suitable living environment were totally different. The energy efficient lay-out trapped heat in the tropics, making the buildings useless as living and working space. There was not experience with building with locally available building materials either, which led to huge shipments of supplies and rising costs. In Schangtienrand, the complicated logistics seemed easy to disrupt by opposing locals, which meant that no urbanate was finished during the first 5 decades.

The former agrinate of Tadisch in Sokoku
The former agrinate of Tadisch in Sokoku after its redevelopment into a residential unit at a military training facility. Originally, the agrinate replaced three rural villages on the island of Shuuen.

In Schangtienrand, where the Häverists never were able to colonise the entire island, building the urbanates was a slow process without much effect. The three main urbanates took more than four decades to build and were far from complete when the native rebels conquered Schlung. The first thing the new government did was to remove the partially completed segregation and make room for a public transport system between the different parts of the city. However, the urbanate was not demolished completely, like so many of the local population would like to have seen happen. Even the new regime needed the residential space in the buildings for their new capital.

But the resistance against forced relocation to urbanates and agrinates has played in important role in the liberation of Schangtienrand and later Neusüdentor. Especially notorious was the example of Tadisch, an agrinate of a single 14 storey building with 200 apartments to which the population of three villages forcibly was relocated in order to create efficient agricultural plots in the area. The villages were bulldozed to make room for large plots that easily could be managed. But when it became obvious that the military and most Hellish settlers had moved in to new buildings on the ground level, it was clear that the Häverists had applied the agrinate in a way that supported Anarian racism. Ironically enough, after the removal of Häverist rule, the complex was used to gather repatriating Hellish citizens, then as a military prison for Häverist prisoners of war and finally it was renovated into the residential complex for a military training complex for the Sokokan army.