Harrisburg – Vanilla City

During the 1700 the British Empire stablished a small trading port and named it Harrisburg in Honour of their captain Lord Harry who tragically died while inspecting the liquors area when his head accidentally fell inside a barrel causing him to drown.

The town didn’t experience growth until the turn of the century, when they discovered Coal in the area, a man named William Williams founded the Williams Coal Company and started to export the product to the empire’s capital where the invention of the steam engine was making it a vital resource; so much was the abundance that the Williams Company expanded and created their own town called Coalville, built new towns for workers to live, rail lines, to transport them to and from the extraction plant, as well as a new harbour and a massive rail sistem to get the coal to ships as fast as possible.

The city continued to grow the rest of the 19th century, with a state of the art rail system, a new university built by the Coal Company but there still was hunger for more.

It was 1911 when in the construction site of a so-called skyscraper a dark substance started to emerge from a hole, the construction company called the Coal Co. to review the substance, believing it was a mixture of coal and oil result of the extraction proces of the company. The Coal Company then decided to buy the site as well as the sorrounding blocks. THEY HAD FOUND CRUDE OIL. From then on the Williams Coal Company changed its name to Williams Energy Co.

From 1940-1960:
The harbour wasn’t just a coal distribuition center, it now had an Oil refinery and HUGE oil tanks all over the place, the situation couldn’t be better for the Co., they bought an entire neighbourhood to extract the oil underneath it, they demolished every house road and fence in the area and then disaster occured.

1961:
During a night of february, a 2 plane collision occured over the city, the remainings of the 2 planes loaded with flammable materials spiraled down towards the city. They struck the Harbour, the coal wagons waiting to be unloaded where quickly engolfed in flames, in a matter of minutes the oil tanks were sorrounded by flames, one of them exploded causing serious damage to the oil refinery…
36 days later the fire was finally put off, the harbour was no more, in it’s place was a huge crater shapped lagoon caused by the hundreds of explotions. The Williams Energy Co. was under public scrutiny, the government was conducting an investigation into the Company for safety violations in storage units as well as workers safety. The company was charged with 5B dollars, that, incluiding the cost of rebuilding the harbour to be able to sell again was too much for the company to take.

1962:
The Williams Energy Co. closed its doors, the city took possesion of the remainig Co. assets as a form of pay.

The Remains:
The extraction plant (Coalville) was split into two areas, the riverside area where the train loading occured was bought by Armstrong Venture Capital, it was redeveloped into a Forestry company, the rest of coalville was developed into a residential area with a leisure area near a remaining train station. The University was renamed as a petition from the neighbours.
As for the Harbour, the city decided by popular vote to level the crater and build a tourism and bussines district, it was named "Old Harbour", it was suposed to have a big passenger terminal, but the project remained unbuilt with deserted roads for a decade. A new cargo harbour was built far away, in an area that the company was planing to build an exclusive oil harbour, near the demolished neighborhood
In the land of the demolished neighborhood an airport was built. Leaving the oil deposits untouched under the runways.

After the events the city lacked the funds to carry on with the projects it set out to do, to solve this, the city aproved the "Rebuilding Act" and the "Infrastructure Act" witch allowed private investors and realestate developers to carry on with the projects and the city would pay them over time, but because of a not so well redacted paragraph, the companies exploited the system by building, for the most part, luxury apartments, hotels and exclusive neighborhoods.
Two of the most controvertial projects were the "New Downtown" and "Little Hong Kong" they were built in the site of an old quarry, near a small Fishermen’s harbour, the project destroyed the pier and put a harbour in its place, the city then built new piers for the fishermen.
Recently the area was bought back by the city and redevelopment of the area has started.

The rail network was too expensive to maintain so a private company was called in to manage the rail network and public transport all over the city, the Company "TR Public Transport" reused the area of the old rail lines to build an underground metro line and sell the land above, this led to a problematic and underused metro system.
The TR Co. proposed to build an international rail station by connecting the city’s rail lines with the outside lines, the station was built by the city, but the company never built the rail line

City Areas As of Now:

Old Harbour – The redeveloped area of the old port

Littleport Harbour – A surviving (but unrecognizable) area of the original harbour with remainig oil Tanks

Railyard Commons – A recent development in the site of the old main train station and railyard.

Auckland Zoo – As most of the streets in the city centre, the zoo was named after a city from the empire.

Kensington Park – A High income residential area, with a historic park and Library

Dark Past Park – Location of the Williams Co. HQ, now turned in to a park

The City – A redeveloped area that has atracted high-end office buildings

Collingham, Brancaster, Foxbury, Clinton Park – City built neighborhoods

Pub Hill – Where most pubs where back in the day, now a low density neighborhood

Greenway Commons – Recent development of the Lank Co. in the site of an old bus terminal. (The new terminal is directly in front, built on unused zoo property)

Greenway Park – Redeveloped in the 80’s because of Crime in the area, an old park was rebuilt, a hospital and many other public services were built.

University campus B and C – This extension was build in the place of the research labs of the Williams Co. in an attempt to boost Greenway Park.

Cambridge Square – University owned property for student accomodation.

The bridge – Located under the I-35 overpass this place is full of activities for college students

Woodland Hights – Originally named as "Heights" a spelling mistake in an advert has changed the history of Harrisburg’s first exclusive neighborhood.

Barkway, New Munsten, Euston, Bedford, Slogh, Lancaster, AirViews, Chessemount – Originally residential areas for non Coalville workers

New Horizons, Woodland, Mount Woodland, Best Views, Lewisham, Sealand, Welsbury – Developed by the Lank Co.

New London, Olmos Park, Alameda heights – Exclusive areas of the development, .

Suton, Coalville, Coolville – Original site of extraction of coal, now redeveloped in to two residential areas and a leisure district

New Downtown, Little Hong Kong – Developed by the Lank Co. on a quarry. The project was halted by the city because of the environmental damage it was causing. Recently bought by the city.

Hamilton Heights, Halifax – Originally called "Williams heights" the neighborhood was split.

Frome, Middleton, Bradninch, Ivybridge, Oxford Park etc.. – Original worker’s residential areas that were connected by a rail bridge now converted to a road bridge.

….

Issues:
The city is barely breaking even
Industries are fleeing the city
Public Transport is "Bad"
Regional government has imposed a "Green belt" and don’t allow the city to expand outside the marked area (the Tiles)