Sierra

Sierra, officially the City of Sierra, is the most populous city in both the Commonwealth of Verona and Cartadania, as well as the center of the Palm Coast metropolitan area. With a 2020 census population of 8.7 million, Sierra is the most densely populated major city in the nation. Situated in Northern Verona, Sierra is known for its tropical climate as is much of the rest of Verona, as well as its ethnic diversity, sprawling metropolis, and as a major center of the Cartadanian entertainment industry.

Located in a large coastal basin, Sierra covers an area of about 8,247.9 square kilometers (3,187.5 sqmi). The city is also the seat of Sierra County, the most populated county in the country. Sierra is the center of the Sierra metro area, with 19 million residents, and is part of the larger designated Palm Coast area, the most populous in the nation with a 2020 population of 37.8 million.

History
Sierra established the first municipal zoning ordinance in Cartadania. In April of 1901, Sierra City Council promulgated residential and industrial land use zones. The new ordinance established three residential zones of a single type, where industrial uses were prohibited. The proscriptions included barns, lumber yards, and any industrial land use employing machine-powered equipment. These laws were enforced against industrial properties after-the-fact. These prohibitions were in addition to existing activities which were already regulated as nuisances. These included explosives warehousing, gas works, oil-drilling, slaughterhouses, and tanneries. Sierra City Council also designated seven industrial zones within the city. However, between 1901 and 1908, Sierra City Council created various exceptions to the broad proscriptions which applied to these three residential zones, and as a consequence, some industrial uses emerged within them. There are two differences from the 1901 Residence District Ordinance and later zoning laws in Cartadania. First, the 1901 laws did not establish a comprehensive zoning map as the 1909 Calaine City Zoning Ordinance did. Second, the residential zones did not distinguish types of housing: it treated apartments, hotels, and detached-single-family housing equally.

In 1903, Palmdale merged into Sierra, with 10 film companies already operating in the city at the time. By 1914, more than 80 percent of the nation's film industry was concentrated in Sierra. By 1925, the population surpassed one million. In 1930, the city hosted the Olympics.

During the Great War, Sierra was a major center of wartime manufacturing, such as shipbuilding and aircraft. Vivaldi built hundreds of ships, and the Sierra area was the headquarters of six of the country's major aircraft manufacturers. During the war, more aircraft were produced in one year than in all the pre-war years, combined. Manufacturing in Sierra skyrocketed.

Geography
Sierra is located 339 miles northeast of Georgetown and 291 miles southeast of Alahuela and the Alexandria border.The city has a total area of 8,247.9 square kilometers (3,187.5 sqmi). Much of the city was built on forested land, marshes, or swamps, and all are still visible in surrounding areas. Flat terrain and extensive greenfield development have combined to worsen flooding. Downtown stands about 65 feet above sea level. The city owns surface water rights for 2.18 billion gallons of water a day in addition to 230 million gallons a day of groundwater.

Cityscape
The city is divided into over 80 districts and neighborhoods, many of which were incorporated places or communities that merged into the city. These neighborhoods were developed piecemeal, and are well-defined enough that the city has signage marking nearly all of them.

More broadly, the city is divided into the following areas: Downtown/Central Sierra, Eastside Sierra and Torino, Pacifica, Lakeland, Greater Venturas, Vegas, Woodlands, Westwood, and the Saratoga and Dominion Valleys.

Overview
The city's street pattern generally follows a grid plan, with uniform block lengths and occasional roads that cut across blocks. However, this is complicated by rugged terrain, which has necessitated having different grids for each of the valleys that Sierra covers. Major streets are designed to move large volumes of traffic through many parts of the city; many of them are extremely long: Adrena Boulevard is 43 miles (69 km) long, while Follett Boulevard is over 60 miles (97 km) long, reaching as far west as Guines County. Traffic congestion is a major issue within the city's urban core during rush hour, as some four million people are active in the extensive road network.

Sierra is strongly characterized by the presence of low-rise buildings. Outside of a few centers such as Downtown, the Woodlands, Venturas, Torino and Westwood, skyscrapers and high-rise buildings are not common. The few skyscrapers that are built outside of those areas often stand out above the rest of the surrounding landscape. Most construction is done in separate units, rather than wall-to-wall. That being said, downtown Sierra itself has many buildings over 30 stories, with fourteen over 50 stories, and two over 70 stories. Also, Sierra is increasingly becoming a city of apartments rather than single family dwellings, especially in the dense inner city and Torino neighborhoods.

Climate
Sierra has a tropical monsoon climate (Köppen climate classification Am) with a marked drier season in the winter. Its sea-level elevation, coastal location, position relative to the equator, and proximity to the Ecinis Current shape its climate. With January averaging 68.2 °F (20.1 °C), winter features highs generally ranging between 73–80 °F (23–27 °C). Cool air usually settles after the passage of a cold front, which produces much of the little amount of rainfall during the season. Lows fall below 50 °F (10 °C), an average of 10-15 nights during the winter season following the passage of cold fronts.

The wet season begins some time in May, ending in mid-October. During this period, temperatures are in the mid 80s to low 90s (29–35 °C), accompanied by high humidity, though the heat is often relieved by afternoon thunderstorms or a sea breeze that develops off the Ecinis Sea, which then allow lower temperatures. The city, like much of the northern Verona coast, is subject to a late spring/early summer weather phenomenon called "June Gloom". This involves overcast or foggy skies in the morning which yield to sun by early afternoon.

Extremes range from 27 °F (−2.8 °C) on February 3, 1917 to 100 °F (38 °C) on July 21, 1940. While Sierra has never officially recorded snowfall at any official weather station since records have been kept, snow flurries fell in some parts of Sierra on January 7, 1979.

Hurricane season officially runs from June 1 through November 30, although hurricanes can develop beyond those dates. The most likely time for Sierra to be hit is during the peak of the Melian season, which is mid-July through the end of September. Although tornadoes are uncommon in the area, they have occured, with the last forming in formerly rural southern Sierra in July of 2009.

Science and technology
Main article: Science and technology in Cartadania

The city of Sierra is home to research and development facilities and attracts companies due to the presence of regionally renowned universities. Science, technology and innovation is leveraged by the allocation of funds from the state government.

Luxury goods
Luxury brands tend to concentrate their business in Sierra. Because of the lack of department stores and multi-brand boutiques, shopping malls as well as the Vegas district attract most of the world's luxurious brands.

Most of the international luxury brands can be found in the Columbia, Palm Coast East or JK shopping malls or on the streets of Oscar Freire, Lorena or Haddock Lobo in the Vegas district. They are home of brands such as Cartier, Chanel, Dior, Giorgio Armani, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Marc Jacobs, Tiffany & Co.

Cidade Vegas was opened in Sierra in 2008, it is a 45,000-square-metre (484,376-square-foot) mall, landscaped with trees and greenery scenario, with a focus on Cartadanian brands but also home to international luxury brands such as Hermès Apparel, Jimmy Choo, Pucci and Carolina Herrera. Opened in 2012, Itania shopping mall has brought to Cartadania brands that were not present in the country before such as Goyard, Tory Burch, Llc., Prada, and Miu Miu.

Government


The city of Sierra has a strong mayoral form of municipal government. Sierra is a home rule city and all of its municipal elections are nonpartisan. The city's elected officials are the mayor, city controller, city attorney, and members of the Sierra City Council. The current mayor of Sierra is Silvia Merino, a social democrat elected on a nonpartisan ballot. Sierra's mayor serves as the city's chief administrator, executive officer, and official representative, and is responsible for the general management of the city and for seeing that all laws and ordinances are enforced.

The city controller is elected independently of the mayor and council. The controller's duties are to certify available funds prior to committing such funds and processing disbursements. The city's fiscal year begins on July 1 and ends on June 30, per Verona law. Presently, Esperanza Minas is the city controller, serving her first term as of January 2020.

The Charter of the City of Sierra ratified by voters in 1994 created a system of advisory neighborhood councils that would represent the diversity of stakeholders, defined as those who live, work or own property in the neighborhood. The neighborhood councils are relatively autonomous and spontaneous in that they identify their own boundaries, establish their own bylaws, and elect their own officers. There are currently about 90 neighborhood councils.

Residents of Sierra elect supervisors for the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th supervisorial districts.

K-12 Schools
Sierra Independent School District serves all of the city of Sierra with a student population around 1.3 million and nearly all of the district's 600+ schools are fully accredited. It is not coterminous with county lines, instead serving it's own juristdiction. The school system is the largest in Verona, and the 2nd largest school system in the nation (based on student enrollment), second only to the statewide school system of San Rícardo. The City of Sierra Department of Education operates the Sierra City High School for the Arts.

Several small sections of the Sierra that were recently annexed are served by neighboring Bridgeland ISD and Mirada ISD. Though Sierra's city charter has a provision requiring all city residents to be served by a single school district, the city's government has not enforced this provision, nor has it made motions to press Sierra ISD to annex the portions of the city within those districts.

Libraries


The Sierra Public Library system is the second-largest municipal library system in the country, operating 72 public libraries in the city of Sierra. It has a collection of approximately 53 million books and other materials. Though it is a separate entity, because Sierra County (and consequently, the city of Sierra) is part of the Palm Coast Consortium of Metropolitan County Governments (PCCMCG), members of the Sierra Public Library and Sierra County Library can utilize a limited degree of services within the other 13 member library systems.

Colleges and universities


There are two public universities located within the city limits: Verona Commonwealth University, Sierra (VCU Sierra), Verona Commonwealth University, Oceanview (VCU Oceanview), and University of Verona, Sierra (UVA Sierra).

Private colleges in the city include the Cartadanian Film Institute, Kaur Institute, Cartadanian Academy of Dramatic Arts (Sierra Campus), Chanel University of Medicine and Science, Sierra Film School, Louis Hertford University (LHU is also the parent university of Hertford Law School located in Sierra), Odros College, Odros College of Art and Design (OCAD), Northern Verona Institute of Architecture (NVI-Arc), North Verona Law School, University of Northern Verona (UNV), Verona Institute of Technology, and Woodside University.

The community college system consists of twenty-nine campuses governed by the trustees of the Sierra Community College District, including East Sierra College (ESC), Sierra City College (SCC), Sierra Harbor College, Sierra Mission College, Sierra Pierce College, Torino College, Sierra Southwest College, Sierra Trade-Technical College and West Sierra College. They are commonly referred to by campus number (e.g., Torino College as SCC 21)

There are numerous additional colleges and universities outside the city limits in the Palm Coast area.

Freeways
The city and the rest of the Palm Coast metropolitan area are served by an extensive network of freeways and highways. The Alexandria Transportation Institute, which publishes an annual Urban Mobility Report, ranked Sierra road traffic as the most congested in the United States in 2005 as measured by annual delay per traveler. The average traveler in Sierra experienced 72 hours of traffic delay per year according to the study. Sierra was followed by Los Suenos, Alexandria, and Tuscany, (each with 60 hours of delay). Despite the congestion in the city, the mean travel time for commuters in Sierra is shorter than other major cities, including New Venceia, Westchester, and San Joaquin. Sierra's mean travel time for work commutes in 2006 was 29.2 minutes, similar to those of Los Suenos and Alexandria.

Transit systems


The Palm Coast Light Rail serves six of the seven counties in the Palm Coast area. It is operated by the Palm Coast Metropolitan Transit Authority which, in turn, is overseen by VDOT. In downtown Sierra, it uses city streets, while outside the central portions of the city, the line is built on private rights-of-way. The system currently has eleven lines, but two lines, outlined in a five-line system approved by voters in a 2017 referendum have yet to be constructed. The Uptown Line, which runs along Sutton Boulevard in Uptown, was under construction as a bus rapid transit line—the city's first—while the University Line has been postponed indefinitely. The light rail system saw approximately 63.6 million boardings in fiscal year 2016.

Airports
Error creating thumbnail: File missing A section of Sierra International Airport in the A Terminal. Sierra is served by three airports, two of which are commercial that served 226 million passengers in 2015 and managed by the Palm Coast Airport Authority. The Federal Aviation Administration and the state of Verona selected the "Sierra Airport System as Airport of the Year" for 2008, largely because of its multi-year, $6.2 billion airport improvement program for all four major airports in Sierra.

The primary city airport is Sierra International Airport (SIX), the second-busiest in the United States for total passengers, and fifth-busiest worldwide. Sierra International currently ranks third in the United States for non-stop domestic and international service with 246 destinations. In 2006, the United States Department of Transportation named SIX the fastest-growing of the top ten airports in the United States. The Sierra Air Route Traffic Control Center stands on the Sierra International Airport grounds.

Sierra was the headquarters of Ecinis Airways until its 2010 merger with Lavanda Airlines with headquarters in Venceia; regulatory approval for the merger was granted in October of that year. Sierra International became Ixnayan Airways' largest airline hub. The airline retained a significant operational presence in Sierra while offering more than 1600 daily departures from the city. In early 2007, Sierra International Airport was named a model "port of entry" for international travelers by U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

The largest commercial airport is Bordeaux-Columbia International Airport (named Curaçao International Airport until 1967) which serves an overlapping jurisdiction with Sierra International Airport. Columbia International is also Premiere Airways central and largest hub. It is the largest international air gateway in the world with an annual 115 million passengers passing through its terminals. In 2015 Omega Airlines launched service from a new international terminal at Columbia airport to several destinations in Coscivia and Punth.

Sierra's third airport is Pacifica Airport (a former U.S. Air Force base) used by military, government, NAA, and general aviation sectors.