Guidebook to Installations of the Jovian Confederation - Chapter 5

Here's part 5 of the Colony articles (after I cleaned up some HTML issues when I first tried to publish it). I'll be posting some gems from my own material as well as more EXO articles...keep an eye out!

Chapter 5 Nairobi: An Agricultural Cylinder

5.1 Basic Layout

• Rotational Period: 82.8 seconds
  


• Outer Cylinder Radius: 1.9 km


• Inner cylinder radius: 1.7 km


• Habitable surface area: 310 sq.km.


• Population: 1.60 million


• Density: 5160/sq.km.


• Overall length: 35.1 km


• Maximum radius (to top of radiators): 3.9 km


• Operational date: April 27, 2168


• Cylinder 43

---

1. South Pole Facility


2. Southern Thermal Radiator


3. unline


4. Comm. Tower


5. North Pole Dock


6. Gee Level

---

Nairobi is built with very few external signs of its role. Much of what it does is either completely internal, or completely external. Both the premium crops (grown inside the cylinder) and the bulk crops (grown outside on associated facilities) make few demands of the design. With that much out of the way, the engineers were free to make Nairobi not only one of the most efficient cylinder designs ever produced, but one of the most pleasant places to live in the entire Confederation.

The layout is the familiar cylinder with polar docks. Unlike the industrial cylinders Nairobi has no spine of any type. What it does have is a very large complex of counter-rotating docks at the south pole. These are used for handling the auxiliary installations that produce staple foods, leaving the cylinder itself to produce premium items resistant to hydroponic or microgravity growth. At the other pole massive radiators similar to the ones used on industrial cylinders serve both as sunshades and as radiators. As a result Nairobi and her sister cylinders keep their north pole more or less pointed at the sun.

5.1.1 Cityside

Nairobi really has two distinct cities: one is located towards the northern end of the cylinder and is known as Denali, and the second is Kilimanjaro to the south. The denizens of each like to consider their city a hotbed of political intrigue, and in some sense they are. To an outsider though it would be evident that what passes as high political guile in these two cities is little more than a simple way for the citizens to entertain themselves. It is almost childish at times, and that is to be expected. Nairobi’s comfort and beauty have become legendary in many circles, and a number of twenty-something Jovians who have somehow overlooked the option of JAF service often choose to vacation for a year or more on the colony. The presence of an undemanding university -- some would say ‘party school’ -- at Denali only heightens this effect. Much of the population of the two cities is entirely transient, either students or simply between occupations.

The regulars are tolerant of this. Much of the cityside economy is based on the money brought into Nairobi by these youngsters, and the population has a pacifistic bent, so there are few snide comments heard about the lack of military service. At the worst the residents can complain about loud parties, and roving bands of partying hooligans. Even these instances are rare. In turn the visitors are more than tolerant of the locals.

5.1.2 Countryside

Nairobi’s two cities are surrounded by huge open fields and forests. It looks like nature has run rampant over the cylinderl; it does not look tended. This is by design. Virtually every square centimeter of Nairobi’s interior is planned and managed, but with that sort of control the need for simple, regular shapes is gone. The forests are mainly orchards, and the fields are full of crops. The appearance of chaos comes from the reality of complete control. Harvesting is labor-intensive, and this, once again, is by design. Agriculture could very easily become a machine-only task, only exacerbating the underemployment typical of the Confederation. Not content to be a colony of button pushers, Nairobi’s planners took steps to ensure that a large population could be employed in the agricultural industry; deliberately finding ways to conduct more and more sophisticated agriculture, this requires more and more trained hands in the field. Most of these changes are even useful, resulting in Nairobi’s produce being a cut above other colony’s. Other colonies have chosen different paths; some of them have managed it well, finding light industries to keep their populations employed while the agriculture machine goes on almost unattended, and others have failed miserably, becoming chronically underpopulated.

Life in the countryside is anything but rural. In fact it is extremely sophisticated. The one universal constant for all the crops grown inside the cylinder is that they have been engineered to grow without respect to any seasonal cycle. Early attempts at establishing ecosystems inside vivariums proved how sensitive plants are to seasonal changes. It was not surprising then that the lack of such changes was also disruptive. In the course of correcting these inconveniences genetic engineers have often been able to rebuild the fruiting mechanism to occur three or four times a year. The various crops are all staggered, so at any given time something is being harvested. Most of the basic crops also have more than a dozen strains. Even the most unskilled worker is responsible for monitoring a dozen soil factors, keeping an eye out for the encroachment of unwanted plants, and reporting any change in the illumination of the area. Still others, specialists in each crop, decide what the quality level for any particular harvest will be. This is based on demand, and on the degree of soil fatigue in a particular area. Anything that falls beneath the quality criteria is not harvested, but allowed to fall and rot naturally to keep the soil enriched. This is only a partial solution, but it dramatically slows the need for crop rotation.

5.1.3 Thermal Radiators

Nairobi’s thermal radiators employ two different types of old technologies. The first set of three radiators are set near the north pole of the cylinder. They are much like the radiators used on the industrial cylinders. But these are silvered on the north side, and radiate towards the south. They serve a dual purpose, both as classical radiators and as crude sunshades. A second array of radiators rims the south pole. These follow the pattern set by the radiators on the spines of some industrial cylinders. They are essentially long spikes with a triangular cross section. They radiate through the narrow knife-like edge. A system of heat sinks conducts heat up the length of the radiator. Both types of radiator are closed to the public.

5.1.4 Communication Towers

As the Jovian Confederation grew the communication needs of individual vivariums grew with it. Nairobi mounts six major communications towers and dozens of auxiliary arrays. The throughput of this system is tremendous, and is expected to keep Nairobi’s citizens amongst the best connected in the Confederation for decades to come. The major towers are arranged in two sets of three, one north one south. Each tower is staggered so that it is mounted with a radiator to either side. This allows them to bend out at an angle that brings them clear of the radiators and of most of the colony’s own interference.

5.1.5 Docking Areas

Nairobi’s northern dock is built to take a huge amount of traffic. It has to because the entire south pole is taken up with a facility designed to handle the outlying agricultural modules. The northern docks take up the slack by allowing all smaller ships to exit off axis. This launch method is tricky, but it keeps the main axis free for incoming traffic. As a whole Nairobi does not require more throughput than the average colony, if anything somewhat less, but operations at the northern docks are always far more hectic than average. Docking fees are almost twice as high as those for industrial or first-generation cylinders, so casual tourism is rare. Large vessels are discourage from docking at all, fees for vessels larger than that which can depart through the off-axis launchers are downright punitive, instead they are encouraged to send auxiliary craft to conduct their business.

The southern docks are even more complicated. They are part dock, part shipyard. They are responsible both for handling traffic to and from the free-floating agricultural modules, and building and servicing those modules themselves. To accommodate the construction yards in the design the entire complex was made to counter-rotate. Unlike the factory spine of most industrial cylinders this section is coaxial to the main colony, making it a simple matter to transfer goods from the docks to the colony and vice versa. The JAF maintains no permanent presence on Nairobi, but in the event that an emergency required military shipping to dock with the colony the southern docks would be appropriated for that function.

5.2 History of Nairobi

Nairobi is relatively young as active agricultural colonies go, but that speaks more to the special circumstances of agricultural colonies than to any lack of age. Indeed, agricultural colonies have always represented extremely long term investments. The soil standard that must be achieved before export of the premium produce can begin is very high, and not easily achieved. Indeed, this stage in the colony’s life is not achieved until several decades into its habitation. Until then the colony is still operating at a loss, with the export of bulk consumables from the outlying microgravity farms barely defraying expenses, and not even beginning to pay back the cost of construction.

The funding allocations for Nairobi were announced in 2145, and the charter process begun shortly thereafter. The charter was awarded to a group founded solely for that purpose, something that occurs in about twenty percent of cases. While the group functioned primarily as a cooperative, it was led by a group of intellectuals primarily concerned with increasing the available productive lifestyles in the Confederation. They were concerned that increasing automation and industrial specialization would soon bring most human jobs to rough convergence. Nairobi deliberately set out to avoid this, to encourage vocational diversity. While the scenario feared by the founders has not come to pass, their efforts were certainly not in vain, and modern Nairobi sports better employment rates than almost any other vivarium in the Confederation, despite the problems inherent in being an agricultural cylinder.

The colony finally came online for habitation in 2168, three years behind schedule after several autofacs were discovered to be manufacturing flawed structural elements. Even then the growth of population was slowed by the initially quiet economy. For the first twenty years only simple utilitarian crops were grown, slowly enriching the soil and bringing it closer to a natural environment. Then the colony really took off, from 2183 to 2190 the population almost doubled, as Nairobi got down to the business it was built for.

Meanwhile, the original charter group had used the slow increase in population to strongly entrench its ideals and doctrines. By the time the population began to rise, most of those who came to Nairobi came because they agreed with those goals, and not simply because a new housing allotment or employment opportunity had been made available. The elections from 2170 to 2212 are an unbroken chain of endorsements and chosen successors. In a very real way Nairobi is ruled by a democratic dynasty.

5.2.1 Soft Science, Hard Numbers

Nairobi’s way of life is by nature precarious. Economically it survives based on the sale of luxury items. If the Confederation were somehow to come upon hard times Nairobi’s economy would be one of the first to go belly up. If that wasn’t bad enough, the residents of Nairobi have become used to a way of life unsustainable in the rest of the Confederation. As a result, Nairobi’s leaders are forever aware of the policy implications of even the slightest decision, and they examine things far beyond the immediate scope of their own colony. Indeed, the colony almost always elects councilors versed in the social sciences, it has become something of a tradition. They aren’t figureheads either, the statements of Nairobi’s social prognosticators are taken seriously throughout the rest of the Confederation.

The truth of the matter is that the manipulations of the government go far beyond simply encouraging more Byzantine agricultural techniques, and keeping eagle-eyes out for anything that might disrupt demand for the colony’s business. In fact the leadership has established much more powerful means of controlling the colony’s destiny through unofficial alliances and under the table contacts that allow them to subtly control virtually every aspect of life on the colony, and to no small extent influence decisions made on Elysèe. It is a fortunate thing indeed that Nairobi’s government has enjoyed such complete continuity, it might have lost most of these capabilities had a new administration ever taken over from the old. Other agricultural colonies have done well, but only Nairobi has seen such uneventful prosperity. Were the administration to change and lose its contacts, it is likely that this immunity would also be lost.

There are exceptions to every rule, and for Nairobi’s unprecedented stability the breakdown was in 2195. Seeing a prosperous colony without obvious corporate giants to compete with them, elements of organized crime decided to see what sort of a profit could be had on Nairobi. Previously they had made most of their money working on the fringes of the great industrial apparatus of Olympus, diverting finished products, making deals both with pirates and their victims, and insurance fraud. Skimming off the margins of an agricultural operation was a new venue for them, but one to which they quickly adapted.

Violence was minimal, there were simply too few opportunities to gain advantage through violence. Somehow this low profile allowed the criminal elements to insinuate themselves into society while avoiding the attention of the government and its network of contacts. Some harvests were reported as failures when in fact they had gone perfectly well. These crops were sold on gray markets and the criminal operation proved itself entirely successful. Indeed, it was too successful. If the operation had been a failure, or even a more modest success, it is unlikely that the turf war of 2197 would have ever begun. When it did they could hide no longer from the omnipresent government of Nairobi, and a handful of arrests were made.

Far more significant were the events that did not make the public record. Through intermediaries the government brought its full persuasive weight to bear, assimilating the criminal elements into its own network. The government could never have hoped to successful prosecute these people, but it could co-opt them with the threat of prosecution. By the turn of the century operations on Nairobi were once again entirely legitimate. While the government continues to find it distasteful to deal with former criminals, it recognizes the need. Most of those incorporated were relatively old, and many people will breathe a sigh of relief when they finally retire. As far as the ordinary citizens of Nairobi are concerned, that case was closed more than a decade ago, and it should never bother them again. It shouldn’t even take much luck to make that entirely true, but secrets do have a way of coming out. It is not lost on the few people in the know, that the government of Nairobi was so easily able to merge a criminal operation into its apparatus.

5.2.2 Politics

In much the same fashion as the policies of Nairobi are decided from the top down, the electoral politics are mostly a matter of quietly steering the population down the path of stability, turning them away from the whims of the moment and towards the track record of times past. This has become easier as Nairobi’s history has grown longer and more successful. Indeed, the native population of Nairobi votes almost sixty-five percent in favor of the ruling coalition in every election. The real instability is in the population of cityside people who are recent immigrants, perhaps not even planning on staying. These people fancy themselves the most political of all of Nairobi’s residents, and in some shallow sense they are correct. As a result the political establishment of Nairobi has done much to indulge their political fantasies. When the short-termers feel included in this way they are more likely to vote for the establishment, particularly when the intrigues presented seem to indicate that there is some sort of a choice. This is rarely true. Usually the people who are running from outside the establishment come out of the agricultural industries, something with which the short-termers are vastly unfamiliar. Without familiarity they are even more likely to give in to their natural prejudices and dismiss these candidates as rural fools. It is this strategy that has kept the colony council completely stable in Seldon Hall since the founding of Nairobi.

5.3 Major NPCs

Nairobi is home to two cultures at opposition. While both are Jovian, it is hard to imagine a greater difference that could come under that umbrella. The NPCs below reflect the dichotomies that player characters on Nairobi will observe.

5.3.1 Vera Kenning

• Age: 51


• Hair: White


• Eyes: Brown


• Height: 160 cm


• Weight: 48 kg

When you’re used to being an ivory tower intellectual, entering politics can be a shock. Even in as controlled an environment as Nairobi it is still a complicated and unclear business. Vera Kenning has put fifteen years into a political career, and just getting over the shock now, as she ascends to the council chair. Kenning did not chose politics, they quite literally chose her. She was selected from the staff of Cornell University of Nairobi to join the manipulative cabal of social planners, and she had accepted almost before she understood what that meant.

Kenning was a sociologist, primarily an analyst of Earth’s Fall. Her academic reputation was stellar and she was known throughout the solar system. However, it would be her first paper on predictive sociology that would bring the attentions of the Nairobi government. For a year they invited her to social dinners, explaining their positions on the issues, and revealing how extensive a network they had gathered to implement their policies. Kenning was impressed, and not too troubled by the regime’s manipulative side, after all, it does still adhere to fully democratic principles.

With the Nairobi government operating as a closet meritocracy, people like Kenning, who would never find themselves involved in politics in any other context, can suddenly find themselves free to experiment with their boldest theories. With Kenning her theories were very much compatible with how things had been run already, so little adjustment was needed. More problematic were her initial interactions with the complex web of contacts maintained by the government. Several situations almost went out of hand, and she very nearly lost the support of the establishment for her next bid for a council seat. Eventually that was cleared up, but not before Kennning learned to be much more cautious in using those contacts. Her experience with this, and recent rise to council chair have significantly reduced the governments reliance on these contacts. At the same time she is even better than any of her predecessors at predicting and manipulating the various factors effecting life on Nairobi. Only time will tell if she can continue this, eventually allowing the government to take a much less interventionist approach, or if it will backfire on her.

Kenning is usually quite self-absorbed, and reluctant to deal much with others. Usually she can be found running complicated computer simulations depicting the future evolution of Nairobi, and of the Confederation in general. She’s an ardent pacifist who detests the cloud of uncertainty that conflict with the inner system has brought to her projections. She was married once, for a decade, and then divorced. She has no children and has usually been described as oblivious to the men who have courted her since.

5.3.2 Kyle Haas

• Age: 66


• Eyes: Blue


• Hair: White


• Height: 175 cm


• Weight: 72 kg

Kyle Haas is Nairobi’s most celebrated agricultural scientist. No other living person has contributed as much to the productivity of spaceborne agriculture. His contributions span agricultural methodology and genetic engineering. He won his name and reputation developing new and innovative strains of soybean that proved even more amenable to processing. Today almost a quarter of the soybean grown in the Confederation is based on Haas’ work. For almost a decade after that he disappeared into academia, his contributions worthy of note only to the most dedicated professionals. When he emerged it was with a new wife and his most dramatic discovery, a variety of water lily that could be engineered to grow the edible portions of several other plants. Potatoes, corn and certain squashes now took to microgravity cultivation with much greater ease. Swiftly these items were phased out of the surface of colony cylinders, opening up more room for crops that were still unique to a gravity environment.

Haas spent several years under low-intensity investigation by SolaPol, which was concerned that his research may have involved certain Edict violations. While there is no evidence that this caused any actual stress on his family, it is public knowledge that he blames SolaPol for the suicide of his wife in 2206. Since then he has become extremely uncooperative with all inter- and extra-national organizations, a position that has made his life in academia just that much harder. It is widely believed that he is seriously considering retirement.

5.3.3 Darren Coleman

• Age: 29


• Eyes: Brown


• Hair: Brown


• Height: 185 cm


• Weight: 80 kg

With all the spoiled youth milling around the cityside areas of Nairobi, it is no surprise that they’ve developed some perennial sycophants. Darren Coleman, current president of the Nairobi Wine Society is one of those people. This is something of a surprise to most of his friends, who thought he was the decent sort when he was working simple logistics and administration job for one of the agricultural sectors. Unfortunately he grew bored with the work, and declared that he’d be taking a year or so off to enjoy life a bit more. He never did get back to his real job and his old friends. Rather he fell in with a group of similarly bored people from across Olympus, who happened to be living in Denali at the time. Soon all his time was spent continuously reasserting his social position as people cycled out of his peer group, and new arrivals replaced them.

The constant exertion of his social skills, and the fact that he became the de facto senior member of his peer set by the dubious virtue of never having moved on, gave him a sense of control and belonging that he realized he’d been lacking before. So he didn’t move on. He took occasional employment, but nothing serious enough to cause discomfort to his social schedule, and went to work enjoying himself. The particular institution that formed the core of his peer set was the Nairobi Wine Society, and almost without trying he became president. In the two years since he achieved that lofty goal he has kept himself busy arranging tasting sessions, and other frivolous endeavors. He has just begun to bore of it, and might be ready to leave this rut, but there’s been nothing to jar him out of it yet.

Coleman has had no serious relationships since he started his stint of idling, and only minimal contact with his old friends and family. For all his slacking he is well read and intelligent, and few things that he sets his mind to escape his grasp. He has recently toyed with the idea of running for public office, and his constituency would directly threaten the usual establishment plans.

5.3.4 Lieutenant Laura Flack

• Age: 25


• Eyes: Brown


• Hair: Black


• Height: 170 cm


• Weight: 65 kg

The sole exception to Nairobi’s military isolationism is its mandatory internal garrison. The colony fields half a dozen Pathfinder exo-armors and almost a hundred Deckers as part of a force designed to prevent any casual threat from boarding the colony. When you add in support staff that puts Laura Flack in charge of more than five hundred JAF soldiers. It may seem like a large assignment for a mere lieutenant, but the fact is that garrison postings have never seen combat outside of the Battle of Elysèe, where several dozen exo-armors from Olympus and nearby colonies managed to exit their assigned posts to join the fray. The truth is, the job is very boring, and not the position of someone on the fast track to promotion either. Flack is an exo-armor pilot by training, and this was supposed to be a quick six month posting before she was transferred to become flight officer on a carrier. It has been eighteen months now, and still no sign of her expected advancement. It has just hit her that this may be as far as her career will go.

Flack runs a tight garrison, just like an officer anticipating review before reassignment should. This may begin to change as she feels more and more overlooked. Her prior service record is largely unremarkable, with the sole exception of a pair of Wyvern kills. One of those was a CEGA ace who had just shot down her flight leader. The fact is that the brass did intend to move Flack on quickly, but Nairobi is such a backwater they have virtually forgotten about her. She has no active patron, so there is no reason for her to be brought before their attention. JAF vessels hardly ever visit Nairobi, so the usual invitations to dine with the captain don’t exist as opportunites for her to create an impression. Flack has been a simple victim of circumstance.

Flack put her social life on hold for her career, so she’s avoided fraternizing heavily with both the locals and the members of her own command. This is another thing that may be changing as she is grows further deterred. As the garrison commander though, she does occasionally dine with Vera Kenning, with whom she gets along well.

5.4 Location: Civic Center

When the short-term population of Nairobi has nothing to do they tend to get into trouble. Such is the way of bored youth. The leaders of Nairobi have chosen to combat this with a bread and circuses approach, encouraging all sorts of cultural events. Of course to have a cultural event you must have a place to hold it, and the colony has funded the construction of several civic centers in Denali and Kilimanjaro.

5.4.1 Description

The Jovian custom of using homes only for sleeping and little else is very much observed by the entire population of Nairobi. At the same time there are few huge public attractions. So rather than building massive stadiums Nairobi is littered with cultural centers much like this one. Residents will usually attend at least one play and social function at a similar establishment in any given week. Out of respect to Coriolis effects the total height of the structure is strictly limited. The first floor is shallow auditorium, split down the middle to allow two stages to share the same backstage workspace. The auditoriums themselves are aligned along the direction of spin. A hall, suitable for large public dinners extends to the south. Restroom and kitchen facilities are also provided. The second floor consists mostly of small meeting rooms. The third is mostly an open air patio with a small food court. The colony government controls the much sought after restaurant rental space, and it is a considerable source of income.