As an aside, I'd very much appreciate if someone could help me figure out the dimensions for the Floating Island. I've been playing with that very neat land size calculator, but, uh, would anyone be kind enough to reality-check me?
That's the spaceborne Fen shopping mall, hotel, resupply point, neutral meeting ground, and general hangout... the one I proposed rather early on in the original thread.
We all know that Bob's referred to Grover's Corners as the Island's much bigger brother...and at 250 acres, that's unquestionably true.
Question is, though...how big's the Island? Now I'm actually kicking around story fragments, though, I need to really nail down details. And I suck with numbers. e_e;
Here's what I've established. The Island is a roughly hemispherical divot of land, with a rather messy cluster of structures on top. Two original warehouse complexes, an array of small domes...and a fairly large amount of open space, for parking, docking tubes, and so on. It's not as neatly 'roofed over' as Bob's creation.
Much of the Island's living space is underground, though, and there's a fair amount of raw earth they haven't burrowed into yet. I'd say by this point, about a half of the complex is "above ground", and half "basement". There's ample room for expansion both above and below, as it were.
Now...I figure the combined currently utilized area is in the region of couple million square feet. ie, the size of a really big mall with lots of parking...which is pretty much what it is.
That's floor space, though - adding up the areas of all the various levels. 'cause the place is multi-storey, right? I'm not sure how deeply its stacked, tho. Maybe 5 significant floor levels (three topside, two basement) of retail and residential. But that doesn't include deeper "service" levels, including the docking bay right on the underside of the Island.
And they haven't filled the entire Island up yet. I figure they could pretty much double the size of facilities with additional digging and surface construction, before running out of room. I mention that 'cause it's something of a plot point...
So...how many acres would be reasonable for something that's essentially a flying megamall and hotel? How many acres for the base landmass, I mean? What does that mean for the external dimensions of the whole station?
I'm a humanities and political science geek. I took advanced math in High School, but finished with a C, and have spent the intervening years forgetting it. It doesn't help that I think in metric, and all real estate is calculated in Imperial. =P
Currently I'm kicking around making it roughly 100 acres of land that was boosted into orbit. A hemisphere with a 1200 foot radius. Does that work? My sense of scale is also a little whack.
This is a high estimate; it could probably afford to be very, very much smaller, perhaps half or 2/3rds of that stated size. I don't want to edge on Bob's territory of "OH MY GOD THAT THING IS FUGGING HUGE", but the Island does need to be of significant heft, and, well...
...I proposed the general idea first, I just never established how big mine was supposed to be. =P
-- Acyl
That's the spaceborne Fen shopping mall, hotel, resupply point, neutral meeting ground, and general hangout... the one I proposed rather early on in the original thread.
We all know that Bob's referred to Grover's Corners as the Island's much bigger brother...and at 250 acres, that's unquestionably true.
Question is, though...how big's the Island? Now I'm actually kicking around story fragments, though, I need to really nail down details. And I suck with numbers. e_e;
Here's what I've established. The Island is a roughly hemispherical divot of land, with a rather messy cluster of structures on top. Two original warehouse complexes, an array of small domes...and a fairly large amount of open space, for parking, docking tubes, and so on. It's not as neatly 'roofed over' as Bob's creation.
Much of the Island's living space is underground, though, and there's a fair amount of raw earth they haven't burrowed into yet. I'd say by this point, about a half of the complex is "above ground", and half "basement". There's ample room for expansion both above and below, as it were.
Now...I figure the combined currently utilized area is in the region of couple million square feet. ie, the size of a really big mall with lots of parking...which is pretty much what it is.
That's floor space, though - adding up the areas of all the various levels. 'cause the place is multi-storey, right? I'm not sure how deeply its stacked, tho. Maybe 5 significant floor levels (three topside, two basement) of retail and residential. But that doesn't include deeper "service" levels, including the docking bay right on the underside of the Island.
And they haven't filled the entire Island up yet. I figure they could pretty much double the size of facilities with additional digging and surface construction, before running out of room. I mention that 'cause it's something of a plot point...
So...how many acres would be reasonable for something that's essentially a flying megamall and hotel? How many acres for the base landmass, I mean? What does that mean for the external dimensions of the whole station?
I'm a humanities and political science geek. I took advanced math in High School, but finished with a C, and have spent the intervening years forgetting it. It doesn't help that I think in metric, and all real estate is calculated in Imperial. =P
Currently I'm kicking around making it roughly 100 acres of land that was boosted into orbit. A hemisphere with a 1200 foot radius. Does that work? My sense of scale is also a little whack.
This is a high estimate; it could probably afford to be very, very much smaller, perhaps half or 2/3rds of that stated size. I don't want to edge on Bob's territory of "OH MY GOD THAT THING IS FUGGING HUGE", but the Island does need to be of significant heft, and, well...
...I proposed the general idea first, I just never established how big mine was supposed to be. =P
-- Acyl