Ushteyghoo

Ushteyghoo is a consolidated city-county located along the Aarnieu River in the southeastern region of the country of Lathadu. With an estimated population of 657,674 and 1,717,832 in its extended metro area, it is the most populous city in Lathadu. Serving as a major port, Ushteyghoo is considered to be an economic and commercial hub for the broader Sedic Gulf region of Eastern Alutra.

Ushteyghoo is world-renowned for its distinct music, cuisine, linguistic dialects, and its annual celebrations and festivals. The historic heart of the city is known for its architecture and vibrant nightlife. The city has been described as the “beating heart” of Lathadu, owing in large part to its cross-cultural and multilingual heritage. Additionally, Ushteyghoo has increasingly been the center of a small but growing film industry in Lathadu, along with the neighboring city of Calleebane.

Ushteyghoo has had human inhabitants since the first century BCE, and from there on grew to become among the largest cities in the region, before officially becoming the largest upon the raising of Calleebane in the 17th century. The city has historically been very vulnerable to flooding due to factors such as high rainfall, low-lying elevation, and poor natural drainage. National and local authorities alike have installed a complex system of levees and drainage pumps in an effort to protect the city. The city of wider County Ushteyghoo are coterminous. Since 1917, County Ushteyghoo has been the most populous in the nation, surpassing County Calleebane.

Early history
The first settlement on the territory of Ushteyghoo was built by Gundioc peoples sometime around the early first century AD. It was later occupied by the Salians. The nearby Salian settlement - Dŵr Tywyll - became one of the centers of Salian Lathadu in the 13th century. At first it was primary a commercial hub, and the Salian military presence gradually accumulated around it, making it one of the focal points of Salian rule. Today this area corresponds to the Eddrymane district of Ushteyghoo. The Salians constructed several new roads and fortifications in the area; the archaeological site over much of this area has since been turned into a museum with inside and open-air sections. The Salian forces settled in and around the territory at this time, displacing some of the founding Gundioc settlers. Llorig map Duny upon conquering the area recognized its key strategic value both in war and trade, ordering the construction of reinforced stone walls around key areas of the town not protected by the river, and set his own palace on the top of a rare high area.

The Ordrish conquered the city in 1646 and 1649, but were unable to fully hold it until 1651. Ordrish rule would last for a century; their rule was marked by extensive construction within the city, first by drastic expansion of the city’s dockyards, and then the expansion of its places of learning. The Ordrish Library, built in 1653, is one of the region’s oldest and greatest collections of historical chronicles and philosophic and scientific works of its time. Both of the city’s major universities enjoyed major periods of growth at this time as well, still in operation today. As a port, Ushtyghoo played a major role in regional commerce in Eastern Alutra, a role that reached new heights under Ordrish rule. The port handled commodities for export from the interior and imported goods from abroad, which were warehoused and transferred in Ushteyghoo to smaller vessels and distributed along the Aarnieu River watershed. The river was filled with vessels ranging from flat-bottomed boats to sailing ships

Following the establishment of Ordrish control, the city’s population nearly doubled in the 1660s and 1670s. Ushteyghoo became Lathadu’s wealthiest and most populous city. Migrants from Ordrey, Salia, and elsewhere began arriving in the 1660s, working as port laborers. Despite the influx of foreigners, Gundiocs remained an intact and vibrant community; they maintained instruction in Gundioc in two of the city’s four school districts and constituted a large portion of the artisan, educated, and professional class of the city.

Independence
The 18th century was dominated by the Lathadun struggle for independence and modernization. Irregular insurrection against Ordrish rule generally began in the countryside, with urban areas typically centers of Ordrish rule. However, following the Treaty of Forbes in 1751, Ordrey officially acknowledged Lathadu’s independence, the city soon underwent a rapid period of transformation into one of the beating hearts of Lathadu’s burgeoning culture. The dynamic Ushteyghoo grew into an administrative, political, economic, trade, and cultural hub of the young nation; ethnic Gundiocs overtook Ordrish in the second half of the 18th century due to miss migration from neighboring overpopulated rural regions, particularly to the southeast. Between 1751 and 1810, the proportion of Gundiocs increased from 39.5% to 85.6%. Gundioc became the dominant language, and Ordrish took second place.

Ushteyghoo’s political zenith as Lathadu’s capital in relation to other Lathadun cities occurred in the Federation Period. From the mid-19th century onward, rapid economic growth allowed it to reach new heights, but also largely shifted rapid economic growth to neighboring areas further upriver to Calleebane, while Ushteyghoo’s relative importance became relatively stagnant. Additionally, the growth of railways and paved roads decreased river traffic, diverting goods to other transportation corridors and markets. With the founding of the Lathadun Republic in 1871, Lathadu’s capital was shifted from Ushteyghoo to Calleebane, further marking this decline. During the rapid modernization and industrialization programs begun afterward, as with other major Lathadun population centers, roadway construction and an explosion in prefabricated housing drew residents from the center to newer housing elsewhere. While it remained the largest by population and its port remained the nation’s largest, the city’s manufacturing sector was overshadowed by those of its neighbors. The city remained, however, the nation’s primary banker, its economy continuing to thrive largely on trade and financial services.

Drainage and flood control
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Lathadu’s government and business leaders believed they needed to drain and develop outlying areas to provide for the city’s expansion. The most ambitious development during this period was a drainage plan devised by Diorval Kissack, designed to break the surrounding swamp’s stranglehold on the city’s geographic expansion. Until then, urban development had been largely limited to higher ground along the natural river levees and marshes. Kissack’s pump system allowed the city to drain huge tracts of swamp and marshland and expand into low-lying areas. Over the 20th century, rapid subsidence, both natural and man-made, resulted in these newly populated areas subsiding to several feet below sea level.

Ushteyghoo was vulnerable to flooding even before the city’s footprint departed from the natural high ground near the Aarnieu River. In the late 20th century, however, scientists and Ushteyghoo residents gradually became aware of the city’s increased vulnerability. In 1955, flooding from a particularly bad seasonal storm killed dozens of residents, although the majority of the city remained dry. The rain-induced flood of 1985 demonstrated the weakness of the pumping system. After that event, measures were undertaken to dramatically upgrade pumping capacity. By the 1990s, scientists observed extensive and ongoing erosion of the marshlands and swamps surrounding the city, especially related to the Aarnieu River-Delta Outlet Canal, had the unintended result of leaving the city more vulnerable than before to storm-induced catastrophic surges.

Geography
Ushteyghoo is located near the beginning of the Aarnieu River Delta in Eastern Lathadu, on the banks of the Aarnieu River, approximately 170 km upriver from the Sedic Sea. According to the National Census Council, the city’s area is 614 km2, of which 72% is land. The area along the river is characterized by both manmade levees and natural ridges and hollows. The Aarnieu enters the city from the south; further north it encircles two main islands, Myrneen Island and Farscreeu Island. The third island, Cailjey Island, is the largest of the Ushteyghoo Aarnieu islands, however only its southernmost tip is within city limits. The river that separates the two parts of the city is 230 m wide at its narrowest point; the West Bank of the city lies on flat, marshier terrain while the East Bank is more hilly.

Ushteyghoo was originally settled on the river’s natural levees or high ground. After the Marsh and Flood Control Ordinance of 1895, the Naval Corps of Engineers built floodwalls and man-made levees around a larger geographic footprint included what had previously been marshland and swamp. Over time, pumping of water from marshland allowed for development into lower elevation areas. Today, half of the city is at or below local mean sea level, while the other half is slightly above it. Evidence suggests that portions of the city may be dropping in elevation due to subsidence. A 2005 Study by the National University of Lathadu suggested that, “upwards of 51% of the contiguous urbanized portions of County Ushteyghoo lies at or above sea level,” with more densely populated areas generally on higher ground. The average elevation of the city is currently between 0.3 and 0.61 meters, with some portions of the city has high as 6 meters at the base of the levee in Hightown on the West Bank, and others as low as 2 meters below sea level in the farthest reaches of the East Bank.

The wide Aarnieu was always formidable at this point due to the small number of islands in the middle of the river. The city has marked topographical contrasts; the East Bank is built on the higher river terraces and hills, while the West Bank spreads out on a flat and featureless sand plan on the river’s opposite bank. The West Bank’s terrain rises with a slight westward gradient, so the westernmost parts of the city lie at the same altitude as the East Bank’s smaller hills, notably Creagh Hill and Roosteyr Hill. The city’s importance in terms of traffic is very central, as many regional roads and railway lines lead to the city. The Aarnieu was and remains an important waterway in the region, and the city has historically been a hub of commerce throughout East Alutra.