Nyhaven

Nyhaven (pronunciation: /ˈnaɪˌheɪvən/) is the largest city in the Federal Kingdom of Lower Columbia. It is one of the cities that makes up the Nyhaven Metropolitan Area and the county seat of Wahkiakum County in the state of Pacifica.

History
Nyhaven was founded by European immigrants fleeing religious persecution in 1580 on Hunters Island, at the beginning of the Columbia River delta. They gave the new settlement the Danish name Nyhavn, meaning "new port". As more English-speaking immigrants arrived, they Anglicized the name, giving it its current form. The city attracted many new inhabitants of the then-unorganized region of the Pacific Northwest to it, and by the mid-17th century, it had a population of about 16,000. Nyhaven expanded onto the mainland within a few decades of its founding, with the University of Nyhaven being established near these new neighborhoods in 1662. In 1679, a fire destroyed the portion of the city on Hunters Island, which was quickly rebuilt on the grid pattern that is still in use on the island today.

In 1712, a native Nyhavener named Edward du Loup was elected king of what would become the nation of Lower Columbia. After King Edward's coronation 25 miles to the west in Astoria, he returned to Nyhaven and led the debates that ultimately produced the Lower Columbian constitution. From the election of the first government in 1715 until 1730, Nyhaven was the fledgling nation's capital; Parliament met in Nyhaven City Hall while King Edward resided in a temporary royal palace just north of what is today the mainly Japanese neighborhood of New Nippon.

Nyhaven's status as capital city attracted various publishers and entertainers to the city, foreshadowing the later influx of media companies which now maintain their headquarters in downtown Nyhaven. One of these publishers established Nyhaven's most-read daily newspaper, the Nyhaven Sentinel, in 1721. The opening of the Nyhaven Stock Exchange in 1782 marked the beginning of the financial sector's presence in the city, as merchants and bankers moved their operations to Nyhaven in droves. From the 1890s onwards, various national corporations, banks, and insurance providers have contributed to the city's growing skyline. As downtown became more crowded, the city reclaimed land from the river several times, most recently to the south of downtown.

Green spaces were present in Nyhaven even in its early days, with the city being centered on Nyhaven Common until the old city's destruction in the fire of 1679. The former site of the common was then transformed into the first incarnation of Founders' Square, which remains the city's main civic plaza to this day. Other squares were laid out as the city expanded, becoming the centers of their neighborhoods. When overzealous developers surrounded Lake Adams with houses in the 1810s, Nyhaven's leaders recognized that they needed to create a master plan for the city that would protect the area's natural beauty. That plan led to the creation of the city's famous park belt, which forms an arc on the mainland, centered on downtown.

The master plan, known today as the Lundqvist Plan, also laid out the locations of new city streets in the area within the park belt, marking the beginning of citywide planned transportation in Nyhaven. When the railroad arrived in the city, the Columbia River Railroad built a massive station north of Hunters Island in 1850. The city's famous mass transit system was born in 1887, when entrepreneur Isaiah Rittenberg opened his elevated Hill Line. Other private rail moguls soon followed suit, and by the 1930s, Nyhaven had eight different underground and elevated rail lines operated by three different transportation companies. In 1942, the city government bought all of these lines and merged their administration under the new Nyhaven Metropolitan Transit Authority. The NMTA quickly expanded the now-unified Nyhaven MetroRail system, adding the downtown Loop by 1949, the Parks Line in the 1950s, the Kings and Island Lines in the 1960s and the Gold and Puget Lines in the 1970s. Since then, the NMTA has gradually extended many lines to serve new suburbs all over the metropolitan area.

Originally, the city docks were located on the shore of Hunters Island, but as more and more ships frequented the harbor, a new port had to be constructed across the river, on Tenasillahe Island, in the 1830s. This port became home to some of the Royal Navy's warships, and the Lower Columbia Naval Academy was established on the the same island not long afterwards. Port Nyhaven became the main haunt of both naval and civilian sailors, with many of them choosing to live in the nearby Navy Village neighborhood. The development of the Pelargir-upon-Columbia port complex north of Kendall in the 1950s and 1960s attracted most of the area's shipping traffic away from Port Nyhaven, but the harbor continues to be used by local manufacturers for transporting their goods to other Lower Columbian ports.

Nyhaveners' infatuation with sports began in 1899, when the Regals baseball team was established. The city's other professional sports teams were all started in the 40 years that followed. At first, they played at relatively small facilities in the park belt, but in the 1950s, the Sporthaven district was developed and its first generation of athletic venues built. These facilities were demolished and rebuilt in the 1990s, after crowds had outgrown their capacities and their amenities came to be seen as outdated. A park designed for use as a haven for amateur and professional athletes was developed on Puget Island in the late 1960s, as the city's leadership began seriously considering the prospect of hosting a major sporting event. In 1980, Nyhaven gained the world's attention when it hosted the Fourth Simlympics. In preparation for the Simlympics, the city added many new stadiums and arenas to the Puget Island Athletic Park, and a series of high-rise apartment towers were constructed just west of the park to house athletes. After the SImlympics, these towers were converted into low-cost housing.

Demographics
Nyhaven is known throughout Lower Columbia as the kingdom's most diverse city, as the city's many ethnic neighborhoods attest. Europeans are the most populous ethnic group in the city, comprising 42.4% of the population. Residents of Asian descent are the largest minority group in the city, making up 27.7% of the population. Approximately 10.2% of the population is of African descent. 19.7% of the population belonged to other ethnic groups or are of mixed descent.

English is the most-spoken language in Nyhaven, being spoken as a first language by 54.9% of all Nyhaveners. 11.6% of all residents speak Japanese at home, 9.9% speak French, 5.3% speak Yiddish, 4.6% speak Swedish, 2.1% speak German, 1.9% speak Swahili, and 9% speak some other language as their primary language. 72% of the population is multilingual, with 38% speaking at least three languages.

The median household income in Nyhaven is Ç17,673 (US$37,114), and the median family income is Ç19,217 ($40,356). 18.2% of all households and 13.9% of all families are below the poverty line.

Geography
Metropolitan Nyhaven sits at the most inland point on the Columbia River delta. Its coastal areas are mostly low-lying, standing an average of 25 feet above sea level. The city's northern and eastern areas are very hilly. Its highest point is Sunset Mountain, north of the Melrose district, which reaches an elevation of 1,063 feet above sea level. The city's inner suburbs contain two lakes, Lake Adams to the west and Rossmore Lake to the east, which were formed from the blocking of Elochoman Creek; the truncated creek begins at the northeastern corner of the campus of the University of Nyhaven and runs southward into the Elochoman Slough channel of the Columbia River, which separates Hunters Island from the mainland. The Nyhaven city limits include portions of five delta islands - Hunters Island (the location of downtown and the population center of the city), Price Island, Tenasillahe Island, Welsh Island and Puget Island.

Climate
Nyhaven has a marine west coast climate (Köppen classification Cfb), with warm, fairly dry summers and mild, wet winters. Skies over the city are frequently overcast, even in summer. Since it is near the Pacific Ocean, Nyhaven's climate is strongly moderated by the ocean, resulting in little temperature variation between days and nights. Summer temperatures generally range between 50-80°F in the summer and 25-55°F in the winter. The average yearly rainfall in the city is 62.35 inches, half of which falls between November and January.

Economy
Nyhaven's economy is driven primarily by finance, entertainment (television and film), technology, manufacturing, transportation, the military and tourism. Downtown Nyhaven is home to the headquarters of most of Lower Columbia's major banks, brokerages and insurance companies, making it the financial capital of Lower Columbia. It is also the location of the Nyhaven Stock Exchange, the only stock exchange in Lower Columbia. Several of its automobile manufacturers and high-technology corporations also have their corporate offices downtown. ColumbiAir, one of Lower Columbia's two national airlines, is headquartered in midtown Nyhaven. In the northern inner suburbs, the major movie studios Thundercrack and Hypnoticarts Ltd. maintain their main backlots. The national television corporations Hellas, LCBC and KBS all have their primary studios in downtown and uptown Nyhaven, and the nationally-read daily newspaper, the Nyhaven Sentinel, is also headquartered downtown. The local studios of Nyhaven News Network and Pacifica TV are also downtown.

Manufacturing has been a major employer in Nyhaven's suburbs since its early years, and the automaker Buechner Ltd. has its main factory near Nyhaven's seaport. Although the city has its own seaport, the furthest inland on the Columbia River, it is rather small, and most of the city's manufactured exports are shipped from the much larger port of Pelargir-upon-Columbia, north of Kendall. Instead, the largest docks in Port Nyhaven are owned by the Royal Navy, which uses the port as the home base of Lower Columbia's Second Carrier Group. In the 1980s, the army established a new base, called Fort Sepulveda, at the extreme northern edge of the city limits; the base employs several thousand soldiers and also provides some of their families with on-site housing.

Culture
The people of Nyhaven are called Nyhaveners. The city's nightlife is mainly concentrated in midtown, where several nightclubs and theatres are located. The performing arts are also housed at the Nyhaven Center for the Performing Arts, located in the Foothill neighborhood northeast of downtown. Several shopping malls are located in the suburbs, and a few department stores have locations in downtown and uptown. Nyhaven has one amusement park, Thrillsbury Park, located in the northeastern neighborhood of Lincoln Hills.

Religion
Christianity has always dominated Nyhaven's culture, as its persecuted followers were the city's original founders. Most Nyhaveners belong to a Protestant church of some sort, including non-denominational churches. Lower Columbia's largest Catholic church, Our Lady of the Delta, is located in the city's western suburbs, on Tenasillahe Island, as is the city's Latter-Day Saint temple. Nyhaven First Assembly of God, the city's largest church of any denomination, erected a replica of Rio de Janeiro's famous statue, Christ the Redeemer, on the summit of Sunset Mountain in the early 1990s; the statue has since become the greatest symbol of Nyhaven's faithful.

Nyhaven is also home to the kingdom's largest Jewish population; most of the city's Jews live in their own neighborhood, located in the inner city to the northwest of downtown.

Sports
Nyhaven is home to the Nyhaven Regals of the SLB (baseball), the Nyhaven Killer Whales of the STHL (hockey), the Nyhaven Huskies of the SBL (basketball), the Nyhaven Thunderbirds of the SCFA (American football, to start playing in the upcoming season), and the Nyhaven Cruisers of the SISL (soccer).

Nyhaven hosted the Fourth Summer Simlympics in 1980, at the city's quadricentennial. Prior to that event, the city was the host of the Kingdom Games, a national sporting event similar to the Simlympics in scope. Nyhaven has been well-represented in every Simylmpiad in which Lower Columbia has competed, with some athletes becoming hometown heroes after winning gold medals. In fact, the city's local athletes are partly responsible for Lower Columbia's victories as the country winning the most medals in the Second and Fourth Simlympiads.

The city has many athletic venues, mostly located in two sports-oriented developments. Sporthaven, located across Elochoman Slough from uptown, is home to HSBC Arena, Buechner Stadium and Rittenberg Field, the home venues of the Killer Whales, Thunderbirds and Regals, respectively. Puget Island Athletic Park, on Puget Island, is the other major sporting center in Nyhaven, and it was developed and used as the Simlympic park in 1980. It is home to Crown Insurance Park, the home field of the Cruisers, as well as Jean Le Conte Simlympic Stadium, King Michael II Arena and the Melkovitch Center for Athletic Development. The only major venue not located in one of these two developments is ColumbiAir Arena, the home court of the Huskies, which is instead located between midtown and uptown, on Hunters Island. In addition, one minor stadium, Melrose Common, is located in Nyhaven's park belt, in the district of Melrose; this stadium is the Regals' spring training facility.

Education
The largest and oldest university in Nyhaven is the private University of Nyhaven, located east of downtown. It has approximately 25,000 students. There are three public universities within the city limits: Pacifica State University, Nyhaven, Royal University, Nyhaven and the Lower Columbian Naval Academy. Nyhaven also has several community colleges.

Like the rest of Lower Columbia, most primary and secondary schools in Nyhaven are charter schools, run privately but overseen by the Nyhaven Unified School District. Some these schools are specialized in one or two fields, but the majority provide general education to the school district's 400,000 students. There are also several private schools in the city. Nyhaven's students consistently score well on the national standardized tests, and the city's educational system is regarded throughout Lower Columbia as one of the best in the kingdom.

There are many libraries and museums in Nyhaven. The largest is the former royal palace east of midtown, which was converted from a royal residence to the Museum of Lower Columbian History by King Michael the Great. Other major museums are located in Science Park, in the Melrose district, as are the Nyhaven Aquarium and the reconstructed Old City Hall, which now functions as a museum of the city's history.

Public transportation
The Nyhaven Metropolitan Transportation Authority provides bus, ferry and rapid transit service to the entire Nyhaven metropolitan area. Most public transportation riders use the extensive Nyhaven MetroRail rapid transit system, which operates 14 lines of elevated, at-grade and underground rail (subway). Nyhaven MetroRail has operated since the late 19th century, when its first lines were built by private investors. The current, city-run organization was created in 1942 out of the two competing transit companies that then existed. Nyhaven has an extensive network of ferry routes traversing the Columbia River, with ferries transporting automobiles and passengers primarily to and from downtown.

Commuter rail service is provided by the Columbia River Railroad, with most rail lines in the city converging at Nyhaven Central Station, just north of downtown on the mainland. Central Station is one of the busiest rail stations in Lower Columbia, serving an estimated 50,000 passengers daily. Local commuter rail service has grown tremendously in the past 20 years, due to the construction of a rail beltway surrounding the city's urban area and a rail loop directly connecting Central Station to downtown Nyhaven. Additional projects extending some of the spurs off of the rail beltway are planned for the near future.

Air transportation
The city's only commercial airport is Nyhaven International Airport (IATA: NHN), located on Puget Island. This airport serves as the national hub for ColumbiAir, with air routes to dozens of cities worldwide as well as the other major cities of Lower Columbia. Over 32 million passengers and 600,000 tons of cargo passed through Nyhaven International Airport in 2007, making it the busiest airport in Lower Columbia.

A smaller airport is located on the northwestern edge of the metropolitan area, in the suburb of Sleepy Hollow. It serves as Nyhaven's general aviation airport, as there are no general aviation facilities at Nyhaven International Airport.

Harbors
Port Nyhaven is located at the southern end of Tenasillahe Island, across the river from uptown. It serves some freight, but due to its lack of rail connections, cargo volume handled at the port is limited. There are three smaller, non-industrial harbors in Nyhaven's suburbs, as well as a cruise ship terminal on the downtown waterfront. Cruises typically tour the Pacific coast to the north and south of the mouth of the Columbia River, although transpacific cruises to ports in other AIN nations are being considered.