Madrisan World Heritage Park

The Madrisan World Heritage Park is a beautiful and expansive nature preserve that surrounds the Alloministry main campus in Sector 2. At nearly 700,000 km² in area, the park is a glittering halo of verdant natural splendor on the otherwise grey hide of Madrisa Prime. Chartered by the Board of Progress after a grassroots campaign spearheaded by Captains Vasydar Oolysene and Desek Gharnum, the park began initial construction some 4000 years ago and required nearly a century to complete. Despite its name, the park is actually a carefully cultivated mixture of many species of flora and fauna from across the worlds of Iolar space, genetically engineered and closely monitored to create a balanced, splendorous ecosystem. As part of the original charter, the park exists to "remind all who contemplate the future of humanity to recall and respect its natural origins, to preserve the beauty and joy of life's self-expression, and to educate the people of better tomorrrows about their responsibility to all living things."   The park is built on a sophisticated terrestrial support system, with a 3 km depth of artificial terrain, including aquifers, synthesized stone, soil, and other geographical features required to accurately reproduce and sustain a variety of ecological zones. It contains a small artificial mountain range, several types and densities of forest, wetlands, marshes, a band of desert, and an extremely small polar region. Within these areas are over 6,000 distinct species of flora and fauna assembled from the planet's own ecological past, the ancient lineages of Terra, and the new lifeforms discovered on the frontier. The park also hosts 5 learning centers, 22 official campgrounds, and several hundred surface-level monitoring stations.  

History

  The development of the Madrisan World Heritage Park was a significant undertaking, requiring the force of two of the most influential Captains of the day and an interplanetary popular campaign that spanned 3 decades before the charter was ratified. At that time, the mega-industrialization of Madrisa Prime was building towards its peak with the natural ecology already brutally maimed by the needs of an exploding population and capital-driven exploitation. Environmentalist groups were nearly nonexistent and those that struggled to find purchase in the public eye were ridiculed as regressives and extremists. Rumor has it that during a joint venture into the Gargant Reach, Captains Oolysene and Gharnum discovered a paradise world, suspended in time, and were so profoundly affected by its beauty that they swore a blood oath to restore and preserve what remained of Madrisa Prime's natural history. Upon their successful return both captains sank considerable chunks of their estates' resources, including all earnings from their haul of archaeotech, into the creation of the Emerald Growth Fund, a first-of-its-kind financial institution focused solely on environmental perservation and green technologies. The infusion of capital was unprecedented and the economic shock to the system rippled across Madrisa Prime. Nearly overnight it was suddenly en vogue to support environmental conservation.   Despite this huge move, the inertia of corporate investement and their political dependents was barely affected. Tensions built as corporations fought for greater right to expand and industrialize the surface, a fight they'd never had to worry about before. These came to a head with a landmark ruling in favor of draining the largest remaining ocean at the time which sparked immediate violent public outrage. For a period of 12 years afterwards the so-called Shade Wars were waged in courtrooms and municipal offices across the world. Towards the end eco-riots swept what would become Sectors 2, 3, and 4 in a rash of terrorist attacks and assassinations. Throughout these conflicts the Emerald Growth Fund sponsored perservation initiatives throughout Iolar space and popular sentiment was extremely positive. Finally, after nearly a decade of further bureaucratic wrestling, the Board of Progress ratified the Madrisan World Heritage Charter, codifying a plan for environmental controls and specifically the creation of the park alongside a litany of lesser stipulations and guidelines for terraforming and strict regulations for industrial production.   The initial funding for the park's construction came from the Emerald Growth Fund and its by then robust group of partners in addition to a small tax initiative through the Alloministry. Most of this first investment went into the engineering of the terrain support systems and AI research into modeling a balanced ecosystem. A small portion was also siphoned into microprojects in interested municipalities. For the next 94 years components of the project slowly coalesced into the first version of the park, featuring a much smaller stable of flora and fauna and lacking a few biomes. The grand opening was a global event and entry to the general areas of the park was free for the next 200 years.   As the park faded in the public consciousness, funding slowed and only the dedicated support of environmental groups kept the park from failing entirely. Both captains had by then disappeared, lost on separate ventures into the Gargant Reach in pursuit of the fabled paradise planet that had inspired them. The Emerald Growth Fund had also transmuted into a more typical financial institution rife with corruption and lacking vision. Several attempts were made to privatize the park but the original charter had forbidden it. Instead, a corporate tax was instated to cover operating costs of the park and admission became paid. Opposition to the tax died in the lesser courts considering the vanishingly small expense compared to the growing revenue streams of the Enclaves and the general admission fee was and remains a reasonable 100 credits for adults and 20 credits for children under the age of 16.   A brief scandal arose surrounding the introduction of new species as it was uncovered several corporate genelabs were using the park to farm creatures for private sale. This spurred an accountability push that precipitated an arson attack that burned 20% of the park. Initially considered a terrible tragedy, this unnatural wildfire led to an explosion of biodiversity support as the park naturally regrew. Aside from these few events, the park has been relatively unmolested, fulfilling its original purpose as a place of preservation and learning so that future generations can experience some of the lost natural splendor of their planet.  

Geography

  The Madrisan World Heritage Park hosts a varied landscape of cultivated biomes, hoping to capture in miniature the wonderful diversity of nature.   The Silver Peaks are a small but towering range of mountains, offering challenging climbs and majestic views from their jagged peaks. High metallic content make them flash like mirrors in late spring afternoons as meltwater sluices the lower elevations.   The Emerald Rainforest is the smallest but most popular arboreal biome, teeming with life and hosting two of the three most popular animal species: the Glimmerwing and the Starshell.   The Whisperglades are the largest forest by area, thick with whisperferns and dominated by a copse of old-growth bluebark trees that stand half a kilometer tall and as old as the park itself. Access to the bluebarks is highly restricted and visitors report a profound awe at their scale despite living amongst arcologies and skyscrapers.   The Bones is an area of sparse scrubland that borders the band of desert, with hardy trees and a unique, poisonous wildflower, the corpse rose.   The largest wetland is known as Slick's Run and is a popular destination for watercraft and birdwatching, named after a mythical hermit who was said to sprint alongside the long-legged silt herons that congregated along the main river's banks.   The strip of desert that embraces the southern edges of the park is just called The Sands and is a place of stillness and calm. Camping there requires a waiver and significant preparation but few places offer as serene an opportunity for isolation and meditation.   The small polar zone sits right on the border with Sector 1, borrowing from the natural climate of the near-arctic region. Few people visit the area, believing it to be rather dead but the highly adapted wildlife can be stunning to behold, though again prolonged camping requires a waiver and accompaniment by a park guide to avoid unnecessary predation by thermoboas and packs of shimmerwolves.  

Ecology

  Given its artificial construction, the Madrisan World Heritage Park boasts a diverse array of flora and fauna including many non-native species adapted to fit the simulated wilderness. The subtle field envelope that surrounds the park and isolates its more sensitive climates has also propagated a strange collection of unintended hybrid species that exist on the margins and in the neighboring area, mostly vermin and pteridophytes.  

Flora

  Most of the plant life in the fecund zones of the park are non-native or heavily modified from ancient cultivar samples. The modern atmosphere is generally too hostile for the more delicate species that lend the park much of its beauty, with the notable exception of the bluebark trees and whisperferns. Both required minimal modification to survive in their new world and have become staples of the park and symbols for ecological consciousness. Bluebarks are a heavily mineralized coniferous species of tree whose high cobalt content and naturally oxidized bark give them their eponymous blue sheen. The oldest examples in the main copse are incredibly tall and are nearly indigo in shade compared to the brighter, more reflective blues of juvenile trees. Visitors to the copse experience mild interference with wireless systems including the noosphere which ecologist hyphothesize indicates some form of signals communication between the trees. There is a a notable charge in the air near the tallest specimens which many say makes the air taste of mint. Whisperferns are actually one of the very few species that is both native to Madrisa Prime and capable of growing outside of the cultivated environment of the park. Small, deep green shrubs which produce pseudo-flowers with bright petals ranging from a neon yellow to a deep crimson, the plants get their name from the pleasant harmonics produced by their fronds in passing wind. In high densities the sounds have a soporific effect on those without modified hearing. The tone of a plant changes depending on its age and if it's releasing spores. Many visitors find the soft music quite calming and the plants remain one of the primary attractions of the park.  

Fauna

  More of the animal species in the park are modified from ancient Terran gene archives than modern stock and preserve the rugged, highly adaptable spirit of humanity's homeworld. Megafauna include an almost unaltered population of grizzly bears and a highly evolved grey wolf species that has developed chromophasic fur now dubbed shimmerwolves. The most popular species by far, however, are the two most visually striking offworld imports: the glimmerwing and the starshell. Glimmerwings are a multi-winged arthropod similar to dragonflies with a sophisticated bioluminescent communication system. There is some evidence that the creatures are intelligent in a rudimentary way, perhaps having a limited hive mentality with greater function than an individual creature. Migrations during seasonal shifts are a spectacular sight as billions of the creatures swarm across the park creating a brilliant light show. Starshells, or the Greater Marine Starshell, as it is properly called, are a species of large, photosynthetic reptiles named for their beautiful crystalline shells. One of the species subject to the illegal farming scandal of the park's middle years, the natural population of the park holds steady around 3 million individuals, making them rather rare. They live in all biomes as their means of energy collection cares little for environmental conditions as long as they can gather sunlight. The largest specimen on record had a shell diameter of 4 meters and weighed almost 5 tons before its death of natural causes. The shell remains on display in the grand hall of the main learning center at the heart of the park.  

Climate

  The climate within the Madrisan World Heritage Park is a marvel of technological achievement, maintained by advanced atmospheric regulators. These systems, developed specifically for the park during its construction, represented a breakthrough in terraforming technology. Capable of controlling temperature, humidity, and local weather patterns, the devices became a huge boon to colonization efforts farther afield in Iolar space. For the park, a system of 200 of the regulators manage the entire swath in conjuction with an energy field system that prevents interference with the general climatology of the planet in either direction. Most of Sector 4's high end resorts use similar systems to maintain their own artificial environments though to far less drastic effect. The park's system tries to model the natural rhythm of seasons before the total industrialization of the planet with obvious concessions for the constant pressure of the planet's current environmental abuse. To support this the weather is controlled algorithmically using open source artificial intelligence to prevent touristic hijacking of the park. It is explicitly not a human paradise and snobbish visitors' demands to make alterations to the weather are refused without exception.  

Legal Oversight

  Over the thousands of years of the park's continuing existence, its management has changed significantly but always guided by the original stipulations and spirit of the charter. Few amendments have been made to the founding document and a consistent stable of environmental activist investment have rebuked any attempts to worsen the protections of the park, in several cases fatally. Initially the direct oversight of the Emerald Growth Fund as proxy to the 2 Captains' interests held control of the park with minimal input from the Alloministry. Over time, and especially in the wake of the Captains' disappearances, the Alloministry was obliged to establish more sociable administration of the park. The imposition of maintenance taxes of course met with resistance and several formal motions were put forward by corporate bodies to abolish the park's charter completely when the corporate tax was levied. These efforts all failed relatively quickly and public advocacy for the park remains strong into the current day. Currently the Alloministry's Department of Culture maintains majority control of the park and most grudingly accept that there are worse purposes for its shadowy behavior to be bent towards.