Neighborhoods
Breeland Heights
Gigantic gargoyles guard the gated entrance to Breeland Heights. It rests atop a bluff, a playground for the elite sitting in perpetual judgement over the rest of the city beneath it. It’s a community where the tree-lined streets are cleaner than most of the dinner tables of the masses, and the parks that overflow with the vibrant colors of a cornucopia of diverse trees and the energetic sounds of exuberant children. Clearly, the neighborhoods in its shadow below are where the hard work is done, but undoubtedly the money flows uphill. And business is good.
Morningside
The dockside neighborhood of Morningside is perched between the cliffside peak of Breeland Heights, which looms over the town like a golem, and a port of the Doarton River. Tourists distracted by the view quickly realized the mountain protected no one, the port offered no safe haven, and the local pickpockets had very fast hands. Here fathers broke their bodies for inconsistent pay at the docks while sleep deprived mothers rode the funicular in silence up to Breeland Heights to scrub the floors of the rich -- everyone sacrificing so they could one day call someplace else home.
Ballynoir
Ballynoir is another dockside town across the river from Morningside. However, proximity to the rail lines provided more work in the newer factories than on the older docks. Here, if you’re part of the neighborhood you’re part of the family and family is everything. In the center of town sit the two vastly different buildings that encapsulate the two sides of social life in Ballynoir – the historic St. Concord’s Cathedral and the new McVicker’s Theater. The neon lights of the cinemas and shops highlighted a tempting new nightlife, and the whole town went to church on Sunday morning to confess the prior week’s sins.
Orchard Park
In Orchard Park, the visual appeal of trees dotting streets in front of two-story houses have been replaced with the functionality of incandescent streetlamps. Orchard Park traded in the slow life to become a downtown district housing everything from City Hall to underground union halls. The improve night lighting might have been suggested as a safety feature, but it allows as much “commerce” to take place after dark as during the bustling business hours. The sounds of car horns angrily arguing with horses drawing carriages and bouquets from food carts and restaurants set the tone for a fast moving and faster growing area of the city.