Velwythe

The Province of Alpine

Alpine, despite its massive size, is only the third most populous province on Atla. However Alpine city is the most populated city anywhere on Atla. Further, though the province is fairly large, most of the province is made up of the Alpine mountain range (which is generally uninhabited unless recreational campers are counted). Alpine and Gale, the two largest cities in the province are also the first and second most populated within the province respectively. For the citizens of Gale, this has allowed for a mellow atmosphere and great diversity of cultures and ideas throughout the 200 square kilometers that the city covers. Alpine however, has been a source of growing contention, certainly amongst the citizens and natives, and has spread throughout Atla as a prime subject in any election.
Precisely when settlers began inhabiting the city of Alpine is unclear. Bone records and other evidence indicate several high mountain dwelling civilizations were already settled at least 20,000 years ago. Despite the high numbers of remains from that time, most of the early people either traveled frequently, or were met with disasters that wiped them out shortly after.
Many of the locations where bones have been found are also home to crude granite sites of worship or ceremony. The dates of the remains and ceremony sites are inconsistent though, with gaps of hundreds of years between one settlement to the next.
It isn’t hard to understand why an ancient civilization would have a hard time flourishing. Dawn Light peak in Tru Dahn might be the single highest peak in the known world, but the Alpine range is the highest mountain range with the second through eleventh highest peaks covering the hundreds of kilometers from the border of Bedrin to Gale.
Rich in every variety of granite, the mountains of the Alpine province have been known since the first inhabitants settled down, as the most beautiful and spectacular range anywhere on Velwythe. It wasn’t until approximately 3000 PM that the city of Alpine had become fully settled with the first all granite buildings beginning to take shape and cover the valley. From that time on, working with granite has been part of everyday life for the citizens. Within 100 years the entire economy was built (literally) almost entirely on granite with the stone being used in everything from buildings to tools and even furnishings and dinnerware. Different veins of quality stone have been discovered throughout the centuries allowing for easy dating of any structure or area due to the predominate change in structure and tool color. This has provided a clear timeline and great history for anthropologists and archeologists
After the enlightenment 250 years ago and the explosion of Magi-Tech that has followed, the city took on shapes and heights never before possible with a stone such as granite. New tools for cutting and shaping along with methods for securing the stone allowed buildings reaching heights of 75 meters and above to fill they valley. Entire housing developments and districts within the city were made entirely of granite.
With granite running through the veins of the people, the stone became more than simply a stone, it was their life, culture, and in some instances their gods. No people on Atla have ever been more dependant and involved in something so completely, especially a simple stone. So when the first railcarts began popping up and changing the landscape, the impact was both immediate and tremendous.
Not by choice, but out of necessity, Alpine has become the nexus of the railline. While the very first years of its operation did little to impact the way of life in Alpine or anywhere else throughout Atla, once its usefulness was apparent, there was no stopping the changes.
The first railline ever built connected to Bedrin and later Morrid, for the sole purpose of transporting military goods (including troops). With only four separate lines in total, the impact to both the landscape as well as the people’s ideals, was negligible. But with the dedication of a few visionaries, the railline spread throughout Atla within a decade. But it didn’t take a decade for things to change in Alpine. Almost literally the people were caught by surprise as things changed overnight. With the approval of all other provincial leaders and the Grand Provincial Councilor, Alpine was left helpless to the quick changes.
Before the railline, 90% of working residents of Alpine worked in some way with the granite. Within two years time that number was cut in half, destroying both a culture and a city simultaneously. Citizens who once worked as miners in a constant search for the perfect vein of granite were recruited by the construction and development companies. Their jobs were no longer a pursuit of beauty, but to simply demolish the mountains to make room for the endless network of raillines. The construction workers, artists as they were called by the locals and travelers alike, were encouraged (some say by illegal and life threatening means) to work on building shoddy rail stations and the carts themselves. Nearly everyone who worked with the stone was ‘encouraged’ to find employment under the massive companies as nothing more than tour guides or in menial tasks to keep tourists coming and the railcarts in operation.
Within the past decade the once glorious culture of the stone and the relaxed life of the Alpine citizens has been turned into a commodity to be sold or shown to tourists as they stop briefly in their travels awaiting their transfer to their final destination. The lifestyle Alpine citizens once enjoyed is now something one can pay money to go see in the same way children will pay entrance to an amusement park. In fact, Alpine is actually home to the world’s largest amusement park, Alpine Land. Sections of the city have been devoted to tourism. Here, people live false lives under the constant eye of travelers, while the rest of the city has been left to slowly collapse.
Despite the advances in Magi-Tech that have helped to build ‘the city in the clouds’, all the technology in the world couldn’t save the city without the constant and loving care the people had given for centuries. Now, entire sections of the city are uninhabited, the houses and shops nothing more than piles of broken granite as the people are forced to work on the raillines instead of their homes and shops.
The city is separated into five districts by immense granite walls stretching 100 meters high and 3 thick (which also encircles the entire city). Each section is ruled by a family (in many cases the same family line for hundreds to thousands of years), which in the past, have all been in continuous contact and agreement regarding the welfare of the entire city (each would rule over one section, but the families would decide together the rules of the entire city and province). Lately, contentions have grown amongst the ruling districts causing a division over the future of the railline.
Two districts vehemently oppose any more growth of the railline and demand the nexus be moved hundreds of kilometers east or west, out of any major city (To the west of Alpine is an area of hot temperatures and empty desert, while to the east, the Alpine range looms majestically. The ideal spot for the nexus then, according to many, would be either in the desert or the mountains. The desert is preferred by many because the nexus of the railline is nothing more than the largest group of stations for transfers to other stations making its location irrelevant–not to mention the abundant space for the raillines to grow. Though more difficult to build in, the mountain valleys would not only prove a beautiful setting for any travelers to take a momentary respite, but it would also put the nexus in a more centralized location on the continent). One of those districts has even gone so far as to ban any non Alpine native from entering their section of the great wall. One district remains undecided on the issue, with some people under the assumption the ruling family is stalling while closed-door negotiations take place. The fourth district is the second busiest in both tourism and travel, where all inhabitants work entirely for the railline. Despite the 100% rail employment, many of the citizens are deeply troubled by the changes but more specifically about their inability to do anything about it. It is in this district where the tours of ‘old Alpine’ take place throughout the decaying streets and vanishing culture. While the last of the five districts is strongly for the rail line and contains within its walls the majority of stations and routes (not to mention shops and resorts).
Because the issue of transportation is something that affects not only the province of Alpine, but Atla as a whole, answers to the problem have not come easily. While the other provinces and the Grand Provincial Councilor all understand the need to preserve a culture and city, they also realize the ever growing need for the transportation of goods and materials that only a more robust rail line can supply. Because of the limited view from both ends, with the citizens of Alpine unable to see the good of mass transportation and the Magi-Tech advances it allows, or the other provinces ability to understand how much of a negative impact the lines are causing the city–because of all this, debates and plans to ‘solve’ this problem have accomplished little if anything at all. And with no major plans to alter what is taking place (beyond simple expansion) it doesn’t look to change anytime soon.