Difference between revisions of "Penzenes"

Revision as of 12:03, 17 March 2007

		Penzenes
		Nation	Germanalasia
		Function	Largest city by population.
		Population   - City Proper   - Greater City	Approx 11 million Approx 18 million

Penzenes is the largest city by population in Germanalasia. It has a very long history, and prior to the marriage of the King of Penzenes into Gerandara's Royal Family in the 7th Century was an independent city-state.

Penzenes is considered vastly different to the stereotypical Germanalasian city. The City Proper retains a vast amount of historical architecture, compared to the typical Germanalasian ideal of 'modern is better', and it is moderately unindustrialised. The setting of a major trading port juxtaposed against the only real tourist sites in the country has sometimes caused the outsider to beg the question as to whether the Germanalasian government is, in fact, de facto ruler as much as de jure.

Districts

Penzenes is divided into two broad areas, the central City Proper and the wider Greater City. Additionally, the Port Sector denotes the eastern-most fringes of the city, covering the ports and the immediate surroundings.

City Proper

The completion of the original city wall around Penzenes occurred in 514 CE in order to ensure the protection of the city state from it's expanding neighbours. At the time of its construction, it was the most ambitious military-related project the city had undertaken. By 620 CE, however, the city had expanded outside of the walls to such a degree that a second wall was built and the first abandoned. Eight further walls followed it, the most recent being completed in autumn 1699. It was at this point that the City Proper was defined as the city within these walls.

The older walls fell rapidly into disrepair as each new one replaced it, with only a few sections of the disused fortifications remaining today. The existing outer wall to the City Proper has not been manned for several centuries, but it is maintained to some degree from structural weaknesses to prevent against any damage from the surroundings should the wall crumble in some manner. The gates have all since been removed to make way for larger motorways and wider lanes, although the main gate's doors and hinges have been preserved in The Penzenes Museum.

The City Proper lacks the skyscrapers and metropolitan buildings of other Germanalasian cities, but still retains the densely packed apartment blocks, albeit of fewer stories and cast in bricks and mortar more than steel, concrete and glass. Numerous shopping complexes have been built, merging the historic architecture of Penzenes with the rest of Germanalasia's thirst for modern and art-deco design.

Greater City

While resembling much more closely the Germanalasian stereotype of tall, blocky buildings of offices and apartments than the City Proper, its loose, unstructured tangle of roads and vast variations in the sizes of these buildings still marks it different from cities such as Beranostra. The Greater City, while housing the majority of Penzenes' population, has far fewer shopping complexes than the city proper - however, as the majority of supermarkets in the area offer rapid, free delivery services, this is not off-putting to buyers. It serves as the city's primary industrial sector - good communications with the rest of the nation and abroad have all aided this.

The Greater City is regularly expanding. In 2005 alone, planning permission was granted for twenty-nine large apartment blocks and over forty office buildings, not to mention the large number of warehouses that get built annually. Land at the extreme peripherals of the city is becoming more expensive because of the demand, which is suspected to reduce the expansion of the city somewhat, but not drastically.

Port Sector

...to be added...

History

...to be added...

Attractions

...to be added...