Royston Valley
Royston Valley is the capital city of McPsychoville and the second largest in the nation, with an estimated population of around 440 million citizens. Considering it has such a huge population, overcrowding is not as big a problem as it might seem, primarily due to buildings being located within the mountains that encircle the city. Located in a natural valley in the Sakic mountain range, Royston Valley is the political and financial centre of McPsychoville, containing both the Spade Hall, home of the McPsychovillian Parliament, and the McPsychoville Stock Exchange.
Pick out a handful of citizens, and you can expect to find a vast number of different ethnicities, cultures and religions in the people proud to call themselves Roystonians. Royston Valley is usually recognised as the most multi-cultural city in the Alliance of Honourable Peoples, but it is maybe down to this that the city has less of a cultural identity itself than other cities within McPsychoville.
That said, Royston Valley has plenty of other appealing attributes - among others, it is the safest city in the entire Alliance. This has been credited to a number of things, but mostly due to the facts that weapons are restricted for police and armed forces use only, and that they are empowered to shoot on sight if need be. Being the political capital of McPsychoville, Royston Valley does not have a singularly elected mayor; rather, the current Prime Minister - Erik Strong - is, in effect, the city’s mayor.
History
Founded at the same time as McPsychoville, Royston Valley became the capital by default. It’s location - encircled by mountains - while not ideal for much meant that the fledgling nation could, at least, hold a military advantage against invaders. However, as the nation expanded, so too did Royston Valley, and soon enough, Canadian immigrants began to make their way over to the new nation, believing it to be the New World in a way similar to the birth of America. Over the years of it’s existence, Royston Valley has never been invaded - nor, for that matter, seriously attacked - and it has paid dividends for McPsychoville; it is the largest city in the Alliance, one of the most economically powerful and a nice place to live into the bargain.
Demographics
The most multi-cultural city in the Alliance, a survey conducted by the Alliance Council found Royston Valley to have the single largest percentage of foreign-born population, which the January 2006 Census confirmed - a total of 44% claimed to have been born in another nation. Canadians accounted for 13% of this, Brits 12% and Kegmenistanis a further 9%. That said, one of the problems in multi-cultural cities - that the perceived majority would soon become a minority - does not seem to appear in Royston Valley; the 44% figure has stayed fairly stable for a number of years.
Religion follows a similar pattern. While a majority of people claim to be Christians, there are a large number of citizens who practise other religions. Judaism and Islam are the predominant religions, each accounting for approximately 5% of the population, and others include Buddhism, Hinduism, Soylent, Yewish and Taoism on top of that.
The main languages aren’t surprising - given that English and French are McPsychoville’s national languages, a vast majority of citizens speak either one or both of the languages. However, some of the less-spoken are stranger; Aramaic and Latin are both spoken by significant portions of the population, and Italian is becoming increasingly popular too.
Geography
Located in the east of the nation, Royston Valley is located in a natural valley created by the Sakic mountain range. As such, its development and growth was initially stunted until the requisite scientific advancements were made - namely, those that allowed the controlled detonation of explosives to enable the construction of buildings within the many mountains. While many were naturally sceptical, the McPsychovillian government set an example by ordering the construction of the new Spade Hall under Mount Svatos.
Given its location, it is unsurprising that Royston Valley has an extremely harsh climate. The common snowfalls across the nation are only exacerbated by the prevailing westerly wind that causes blizzards, snowstorms and the occasional avalanche. Moreover, in summer the sun has previously caused the snowcaps to melt and cause floods in the city.
Economy
In its early life, Royston Valley’s economical status was inhibited by its location - trying to establish trade routes through mountains is hardly an easy task - but with the development of controlled explosives, it was made far easier. Environmentalists naturally protested when large sections of the mountain range were blasted away to provide a clear route to the city, but there was no other alternative to be found - it was probably the best option as well; a subterranean route through the body of the mountain meant Royston Valley retained its defensive capabilities, and opened up the door for subterranean housing and industry, among other use.
Traditionally, Royston Valley has been closest to Canada in terms of both political and economical affiliation - as well as being the main port of call for Canadian immigrants, Royston Valley also has a number of lucrative trade routes with Quebec and Montreal, with goods as diverse as electronics equipment and cars to small and large arms being exported.
Being an economic powerhouse within McPsychoville, Royston Valley is home to the National Stock Exchange, which is statistically the fourth largest in the Alliance in terms of market capitalization. Interestingly, the NSE is one of the few to be publicly listed itself - currently, the state owns a majority of just 59%, and the few investors who took a gamble on it have seen their risk pay immense dividends.
Unlike a lot of other nations, Royston Valley does not have one particular economical and financial sector, despite being the home of many major corporations, most prominently the Incinerex Corporation and Cirrus Nuclear Power. It also contains the Bank of McPsychoville, which frequently vies for power against the McPsychovillian Central Bank.
Royston Valley’s GDP is estimated to be in the region of eleven trillion US$, a significant percentage of the nation’s as a whole. It’s GDP per capita is slightly lower than the nation’s though, at just under 29,000 US$
Education
Royston Valley is home to two universities, one of which - the Royal University of Royston Valley - has the largest student population of any in the country; more than ninety thousand students over its three campuses. The other - the Pinchek School of Performing Arts - has a population of sixteen thousand students, who study a whole range of courses.
There are also a small number of ESL (English as a Second Language) schools dotted around the city, the most prominent of which - the Newman Tertiary School - was recently praised in the Deadbolt Sentinel as a centre of excellence.
