EN World City Project: Geography

[Jolly Giant]

Jolly: it looks like you reversed direction in the river! The river flows left to right: outflow out of the lake is towards the left, ocean is somewhere to the right.

In other words, you're going to have to switch around the location for the Squats etc, and the posh districts!

Dang! Is that really how the river runs? I thought you had to cross the lake and go down another river to get to the sea?

You mean the river flows UP the delta, OVER the mountains to get to the sea?

 

[Conaill]

You mean the river flows UP the delta, OVER the mountains to get to the sea?

Sorta. The delta isn't really a delta, the river flows out of the lake at left, around the big island, through the city, and then through a narrower channel in between the mountains, to the sea at right. (Hope I got that right... )

 

[Lalato]

You mean the river flows UP the delta, OVER the mountains to get to the sea?

I just noticed that you had river boats going to Kul Moren. There is no river that goes to Kul Moren. There may be some small streams that come from Kul Moren into the lake, but that's about it.

Lake Enoria is partially spring-fed. The River Mor flows East from the lake. It is modeled after Lake Ontario which flows into the St. Lawrence River.

The River Mor does eventually deposit into the sea 1000 or more miles away. My guess is that it probably joins another river before meeting the ocean.

Lake Enoria itself is roughly the size of Lake Ontario... meaning it is about 100 miles long and about 50 miles wide. It's a huge lake. The area around it is hilly and rocky with a few patches of farmable land. The hills are great, however, for the large Argali sheep that have become a staple of the local economy.

--sam

 

[Jolly Giant]

Sounds like a mighty strange river... Can somebody confirm this? A lot of things need to switch places if Connail's right.

On a side note:
No matter which way the river flows, there must be some pretty good rapids by the eastern pallisade, considering how narrow the river is there...

 

[Conaill]

By the way, here are some excellent links to medieval city maps, for your entertainment and inspiration...

Historic Cities: Maps & Documents: dozens of city maps, from Aachen to Zurich, and from the 15th century to the 18th.

Dutch City maps from Blaeu's Toonneel der Steden: excellent quality, aerial-view city maps from the 1600's. Lots of water, lots of military reinforcements.

 

[Lalato]

You mean the river flows UP the delta, OVER the mountains to get to the sea?

I noted earlier that the river will have to be widen. Right now, at 100 yards per hex, it's far to narrow to be navigable.

--sam

 

[Krug]

By the way, here are some excellent links to medieval city maps, for your entertainment and inspiration...

Historic Cities: Maps & Documents: dozens of city maps, from Aachen to Zurich, and from the 15th century to the 18th.

Dutch City maps from Blaeu's Toonneel der Steden: excellent quality, aerial-view city maps from the 1600's. Lots of water, lots of military reinforcements.

Wow great links!

 

[Conaill]

I noted earlier that the river will have to be widen. Right now, at 100 yards per hex, it's far to narrow to be navigable.

Actually, I think 100 yards would be plenty for medieval-type trading ships. I'll try to dig up some maps for you to illustrate.

...

Argh! Of course the medieval maps don't have any scale printed on them... Ah well.

Personally, I grew up in Ghent, Belgium, which has a set of fairly narrow rivers running through it. Ghent was an important trade city during the middle ages, and had a flourishing ship trade. Here's a map (caution: BIG!)...

http://historic-cities.huji.ac.il/belgium/ghent/maps/braun_hogenberg_I_15_b.jpg

See those blobs in the river, especially below the fort? Those aren't islands, they're ships.

AHA! Here's a Yahoo map of the center of town, focusing on the quays where the ships would unload their cargo in the middle ages. (that's the area below and right of the fort on the medieval map; medieval map has North towards the right!)

http://uk.maps.yahoo.com/py/lg:uk/l...e&BFCat=&BFClient=&mag=9&desc=&cs=5&newmag=10

Note that on this scale, the river is barely 100 feet! It was probably a little wider in the middle ages, but 100 yards sounds fine to me.

Here's another small city with a river running through it, Zierzee in Holland. Notice the width of the river, compared to the church:

http://grid.let.rug.nl/~welling/maps/zierzee.gif

 

[Conaill]

One more D&D data point:

Our current party is having their own ship built in-game right now. It'll be a Carrack-type ship, with a width of 25 feet. Any river that is wide enough to carry two ships side-by-side could probably be considered navigeable...

50 feet would be a *very* tight fit, but 100 feet is fairly comfortable, 100 yards is a major waterway, and anything much larger would probably split the city in two...

 

[Lalato]

Conaill... that's good stuff.

One thing I would like to note, though... The Dutch may not be the best example for this city since most of their land is close to sea level... and they did a fair amount of terraforming to move the rivers/canals around.

Enheim is far above sea level. If the river is that narrow it will have rapids making it very difficult to navigate... unless, it is also extremely deep. In which case, there will be a good current, but not rapids.

Then again... I'm not an expert in these things... I'm basically talking out of my butt.

--sam