Gotham in Progress (Part 2)

As Stark spoke, a model of a future city gradually took shape in Schiller’s mind.

Just as Stark had said, this really was perfect for Gotham.

Gotham’s main problem now was that no matter how its logistics system was reformed, it would always remain in an extremely saturated state. In other words, there was no redundancy left for emergencies.

Don’t forget, the future Gotham Big Stage would see accidents one after another, with all sorts of villains taking turns onstage and natural and man-made disasters arriving in succession. If a single accident could paralyze the city for half a day, then they might as well stop developing altogether. Everyone would work themselves to death patching things up every day.

But now, Stark had unprecedentedly proposed the concept of a three-dimensional city. Calling it a three-dimensional city was not entirely accurate; it was more like a brand-new honeycomb city, where every cell was an independent structure with its own ecosystem, just like Living Hell.

To achieve this, simply building one structure after another on a flat plane would not be enough. Space could not be fully utilized, so a three-dimensional structure had to be created.

Roads did not have to cling to the ground; they could also run through the city. Parking lots and parks could be built in midair, while apartments and residences could be stacked vertically.

This concept had actually been proposed long ago, but just as Stark had said, Gotham was practically the perfect testing ground. Here, due to historical development, many areas of Gotham had already spontaneously formed this kind of pattern, such as Living Hell.

Indeed, Living Hell was a Slums district, filthy, chaotic, and terrible beyond measure. But that did not mean it was not part of a three-dimensional city. Living Hell had already preliminarily achieved the most critical characteristics Stark described: regional independence, extremely high space utilization, and an independent urban ecosystem.

That meant that as long as its water supply, power supply, and living conditions were resolved, one small honeycomb cell would already be complete.

The same went for Gotham’s other districts. As long as they were renovated piece by piece, one honeycomb cell after another would be completed.

Then, all they needed to do was combine these honeycomb cells and bind them together with a transportation system connecting the entire city. Gotham City could become a true three-dimensional city.

This was Gotham’s unique advantage. For any other city to achieve such a structure, they would practically have to demolish and rebuild the entire city.

The proposal Bruce had produced was actually already very advanced. In his version, he had designed a modern city whose urban ecosystem and logistics system were nearly flawless. The only problem was that achieving that result would basically mean demolishing and rebuilding Gotham.

The manpower, materials, and various costs required would be astronomical. Even Wayne Enterprises would struggle to bear the burden of rebuilding such a massive city.

And rebuilding would require relocating a huge number of people, which was precisely what gave Bruce and Falcone headaches.

They could hardly say that they were going to tear down people’s homes and have everyone live on the streets, could they?

But relocating those people meant building new homes, which would double both construction costs and time costs. That was why they felt this plan could only serve as a last-resort backup, and hoped Schiller could offer a better suggestion.

Stark truly deserved to be called a genius cursed by knowledge. Or perhaps it was not about knowledge at all; compared to Batman, he was simply more unconstrained and more creative.

Even by Marvel’s era, no city had successfully achieved a three-dimensional city. Perhaps some cities, due to their terrain, naturally possessed such characteristics, but they had not fully realized them either. At most, a small portion of their districts had taken on the beginnings of such a form.

But if this plan were applied to Gotham, it would indeed achieve low reconstruction costs, short investment time, and leave plenty of transportation redundancy.

Very quickly, the enthusiastic Stark used Jarvis’s computational abilities to produce a detailed plan. It even came in three versions and six renovation schemes. Then he stood with his hands on his hips and said smugly, "Now who is the greatest genius in the world? Of course, Stark!"

"Indeed." After reading the proposal, Bruce gave his answer. "Your friend really is a genius."

Although he did not understand why the Symbiote in his head let out a string of terrified gurgles upon seeing the handwriting on it before hiding away, Bruce was still very satisfied.

"Would he be interested in developing his career in Gotham? Wayne Enterprises would offer him quite a generous salary," Bruce asked.

"That would probably be difficult. He doesn’t actually lack money, and he thinks very highly of himself. He probably wouldn’t work for anyone."

"A common flaw among geniuses," Bruce said. But he did not think much of it. There were too many geniuses in the world; it was impossible for all of them to work for him. Besides, with Gotham’s reputation, anyone with half a brain would not come here.

After they showed the plan to the architectural planning experts they had hired at great expense, everyone was left in awe. In this era, without the aid of computers, ordinary urban planning proposals generally did not provide too many details. Most details were only confirmed after construction began.

But because Stark had Jarvis, a super artificial intelligence far ahead of its time, to assist with calculations, the plan he provided was more detailed than a Lego assembly manual. It was practically precise down to the height of every wall, the load-bearing range of every pillar, the layout of every electrical wire, and so on.

Simply put, if they followed these materials step by step, constructing it would be as easy as building with blocks, and they would end up with a brand-new Gotham City.

And because the modifications were relatively minor, mostly additions rather than demolition, there was no need for large-scale relocation and resettlement. At most, small-scale relocations would be needed while existing buildings were renovated, which was entirely within the acceptable limits of Falcone and Wayne Enterprises.

Schiller gave them a suggestion: Rome was not built in a day. There was no need to start with the hardest part. They could find the easiest place to renovate first. Even if something went wrong, it could not get any worse.

That was right. The place was Living Hell. The living conditions there were truly beyond description. Both Bruce and Falcone had visited it before, and they agreed with Schiller’s view: no matter how they renovated that hellhole, it could not become worse than it already was.

Thus, the pilot site for Gotham City’s first-phase renovation plan was set in Living Hell.

Living Hell naturally had residents, and quite a lot of them. When they heard the place was going to be rebuilt, they were unwilling, but there was nothing they could do. If it had only been Wayne Enterprises, that would have been one thing, but the Falcone family was involved as well. They ruled all the Mafia families in Gotham, and the residents had no way to resist. Once they heard there would be compensation, they were already planning to take the money, move away, and never come back.

But to their surprise, this renovation was not a grand demolition and reconstruction project. It was more like patching and repairing.

First, construction teams jointly formed by the Mafia families hired a large number of people to thoroughly clean the place inside and out.

Living Hell had originally had no garbage disposal facilities whatsoever. Most trash was simply thrown out of windows, turning the area into a massive garbage dump. Just clearing away all that trash required thousands of people and took several days.

Then the waterworks teams entered and began a comprehensive overhaul of the area’s pipes. According to Stark’s blueprints, the water facilities of a three-dimensional city had to include not only complete access to tap water, but also solar water heaters and water purification systems.

Schiller directly skipped the water heater part. Gothamites were not that particular. It was only 1987—if they wanted hot water, couldn’t they boil it themselves?

But water purification systems really were necessary, and that was where Bruce stepped in. He set up regional purification pumps buried beneath each honeycomb city module, used to purify and filter the area’s recycled water and conveniently filter wastewater before discharging it into the sea.

When Batman acted, the results were naturally extraordinary. The output of this purification system was already more than enough to meet the needs of recycled domestic water, and it was highly environmentally friendly as well.

Next came laying water pipes and connecting them to the tap water system. Living Hell had more than 2,800 water access points, and once the work was complete, nearly every household had water piped directly indoors. They no longer needed public wells or water pumps.

Then the electrical system entered the picture, and Bruce personally designed this part as well. Gotham City actually had abundant electrical power; it simply was not used efficiently.

All the illegally strung wires and antennas in Living Hell were removed. Stark had already used Jarvis to calculate the optimal wiring plan, and when it was implemented, Batman further adapted it to local conditions. Once the wiring was complete, not a single electrical cable could be seen anywhere in the district, yet power utilization was extremely high and electricity ran without interruption all day.

After that came gas and heating, and their solutions were largely the same.

In addition, the passages inside Living Hell were refined. The original dozens of gut-like passageways were widened and linked together with the buildings. Without altering the main building structures, all corridors and rooms were connected by the shortest possible routes.

Based on Stark’s blueprints, Bruce also designed a passage elevator specifically suited to Living Hell. The elevator shafts were designed as a crisscrossing grid, while transport pods could travel from residential corridors through the elevator passages to the nearest living area.

Additionally, the entire district received essential three-dimensional city facilities, including a Police Department precinct, an emergency hospital, rooftop parks, ecological forests atop buildings, sports facilities between alleyways, rooftop soccer fields, and more.

Because this renovation was jointly carried out by several of Gotham’s major powers, the manpower and materials deployed far exceeded what was needed. The efficiency was extremely high, and the speed was astonishing.

Most importantly, under the threat of force, there was no need to consider the residents’ wishes. No resident came forward to voice a differing opinion or oppose the renovation. With the full strength of an entire city focused on the project, Living Hell was almost immediately transformed into a complete honeycomb module.

The final stage was exterior renovation, including installing more than 6,000 adequately powered lights, reinstalling insulation on building exteriors, designing anti-theft measures for windows, adding balconies, beautifying building facades, and more.

Inside the buildings, all corridors were repaired, poorly designed apartment layouts were renovated, and every Shop in the residential areas was rebuilt into a modern store.

Fire safety equipment was also installed, including reserved fire lanes, firefighting equipment, sprinkler heads, and more.

Finally came landscaping. Although the entire Living Hell district had no green space on the ground, its staggered rooftop greenery, greenery between alleyways, balcony greenery, and other such features still barely brought its green coverage up to standard.

Thus, when the Living Hell residents who had moved away returned, they discovered that they were living in a place both familiar and completely different.

It was a modern, even futuristic, three-dimensional honeycomb city—dense but not crowded, connected in every direction but not chaotic. It looked as though it lacked things here and there, yet its supporting facilities were complete. Everything seemed to appear where it should not have been, yet it was all incredibly convenient.

More importantly, beyond practical functionality, its aesthetic appeal had also reached its peak.

A forest of steel rose from the ground. The railings of the Metal Passage became branches, countless bright lights became leaves, and as points of light danced through the air, vitality grew from the cold steel skeleton. It suited this mad city perfectly: figures surged through the streets, light and shadow intertwined, cold and warmth layered over one another. The city grew ever larger, while humanity appeared ever smaller.

This was only 1987. Most cities were still in the era of high-rises and highways. A cyberpunk-style city like this would have been cutting-edge even in the twenty-first century; placed in this era, it was simply breathtaking.

And this was not merely to improve citizens’ living conditions. More importantly, two overpasses ran through the center of this modular city, directly tripling the transport capacity of the entire street.

Many truck drivers stopped using the ground-level highway in the neighboring district and began taking the overpasses instead. The transportation capacity of this area instantly soared. And if an accident occurred on one road, signs would light up at the entrances, allowing drivers to choose another route. That left considerable redundancy for logistics transportation.

Ten thousand words today—please vote!

That’s right! This book has been renamed!

As for why it got this name, shorter ones would duplicate existing titles and weren’t allowed, and it needed some gimmick to attract new readers. It’s better than the previous one, right? (Hands on hips)