Political Powers
Politically, the current Night City is more or less run (and we use the term loosely indeed) by a junta of old city government, Edgerunner and Nomad factions, and the few Corporations whose assets have survived the War. This City Council is dominated by the most aggressive or charismatic members of these disparate factions, including:
- The Nomad Families
- The Edgerunners, including Netrunners, Solos, Rockerboys, and other "cyberpunk" types
- The old City government
- The Corporate interests of Biotechnica, Continental Brands, Danger Girl, Militech, Network 54, Petrochem, Rocklin Augmentics, SovOil, Trauma Team, Ziggurat, Zhirafa and (recently and covertly) Arasaka
Since Night City is far too chaotic post-War to have a centralized City government, the Night City Council is made up of City Managers from the different districts and neighborhoods of the City. Even the Combat Zones have City Managers, though they have effectively no control over the gangs of the Zones. A City Manager chosen by their fractious group is nominally in charge of each area of the City, as opposed to a mayor, which is a purely ceremonial title that still remains in some areas like San Francisco. The Council and City Managers are theoretically in charge of:
- The local sections of the Data Pool.
- Zoning designations for Corporations and neighborhoods.
- Road and infrastructure taxes (collected from Corps, factions, and neighborhoods).
- Freelance PI and Police licensing.
- City contracts for construction and justice services.
There is no mayor or central leadership, and fights between factions are frequent and often settled on The Street with weapons over negotiation. No one faction holds the upper hand, but between shifting alliances and agendas, somehow things generally get done without descending into open warfare on The Streets.
Although badly underfunded and strapped for supplies, Night City has its own Police, Fire, and Emergency Services Departments. Maintained by a levy on the local Corps and neighborhoods, these small units are heavily armed and operate Citwide.
Public Services
The two public hospitals established in the 2020 years (City Medical Center and Crisis Medical Center) are still in existence in the Central Night City area, but they suffer from lower-level flooding and regular disruption of services such as water, power, and communications. The hospitals are, however, the last stand for major surgery and the ability to handle the periodic plague outbreaks that were common in the period right after the Fall. There are now a number of constantly shifting clinics which have become the Time of the Red's main source of medical care; outgrowths of the often-covert ripperdocs of the 2020s, they're where most people go to get medicine, emergency care, and moderate level cyberware installations. The City also maintains a large cryobody bank, a holdover from the days immediately following the Fall when corpses were choking the streets; these cavernous, refrigerated chambers are packed with racked cold slabs filled with bodies.
Data Terms, established in the 2010s, are still located on the corners of many (30%) City Streets, and can be used to access information, computer services, fax-mail, and NET input. It's a testament to how indestructibly they were constructed that they still operate even under the most rudimentary conditions. However, enterprising Netrunners, Techs, and Fixers have taken to rewiring some terms to require a pass card or other payment system in order to access their chosen 'Terms. Most Data Terms are also patched into the local Data Pool system, allowing them to be used as phone booths, message services, news readers, and Pop Media access points.
Overall, the War has totally wiped out most NET traffic outside the City; what has survived the destruction of NET nodes and wiring infrastructure was severely compromised by a deadly cyber virus that ravaged the Ihara-Grubb protocol systems at the War's end. This "DataKrash," rumored to be the creation of deranged master Netrunner Roche Bartmoss shortly before his death in 2021, has made running the greater NET an almost suicidal proposition; the remnants of Netwatch (the global police of the NET), have pretty much banned Netrunners from large sections of the Architecture to keep the Krash from spreading.
This is implemented by literally destroying key NET nodes in the system and taking still others offline. What NET traffic still exists in the Time of the Red is limited to heavily secured VPN or "airgapped" systems limited to on-site traffic within a single building or campus.
The Data Pool is a Citywide information network built on the backbone of the earlier Data Term systems of the pre-Red era. Information servers and exchange systems designed for open use within the limits of a city, Data Pools produce free, open content created through the collaborative efforts of a community of users. In design, they're similar to the hyper-stack "page" system attempted and then abandoned for the NET in the early '90s.
Law and Order
Between the War and the Fall of the Towers, law enforcement in Night City literally fell apart. Gradually, random Solos and Law Enforcement Officers began to reassert control over the roving gangs and looters on a neighborhood-by-neighborhood basis.
The more money the locals had to throw at the problem, the better those ad hoc police units were, with Corporate "rent-a-cops" getting the best vehicles and hardware overall. With their limited assets, Lawman bribery is common and corruption the standard.
The only real survivors of the old Night City PD are the members of the C-SWAT aka MAX-TAC aka "The Cyberpsycho" Squad. Incorruptible to the last and still led by their commander, Max Hammerman, this lone bastion of the NCPD maintains an iron-fisted control over any and all suspected cyberpsychotic elements in the City.
- I Don't Need No Stinking Badges
While Night City (and most Reclaimed City Zones) maintain their own Citywide police forces, other areas just hire a Security Force to protect key city buildings like the local Records Hall and Council Offices. For these guys (and others) law enforcement services are instead licensed to a variety of professional, Neocorporate, private police, and local forces deputized to patrol/control a specific area by the owners of that area. These include:
Once a part of the Night City Police Department, MAX-TAC is now a fully independent organization in its own right. It contracts with neighborhoods, governments, and even private citizens to take care of the most egregious assaults on the public: hostage situations, cyberpsychos, military class weapons, terrorists, etc. MAX-TAC is run by the incorruptible Commander Max Hammerman, late of the original Night City Police Forces. Hammerman is a man on a mission: to maintain law and order and protect the innocent. MAX-TAC has an impartial code that it follows to the letter, it ends fights, no matter who starts them. If you're a security service guy fighting a bunch of boosters, you'd better put your weapons down when MAX-TAC shows up or they'll open fire on you too. MAX-TAC doesn't hold prisoners; arrestees are remanded to the local Hall of Justice/Security Facility.
These are represented by the thousands of uniformed "rent-a-cops" hired to patrol urban areas, office blocs, and upscale living areas. The largest of these is Lazarus Security, the heir to the 2020s' ubiquitous Arasaka and Militech. These Security Services have arrest authority, but maintain no jails; prisoners are remanded to whatever local Justice/Security Facility is in the area.
Similar to Security Services, these are forces directly related to a Corporation. They often do not have arrest authority or the right to maintain jails, but rumors abound of covert prisons beneath Corporate HQs.
These are personal security forces that have been licensed and bonded by the local City government, much like getting a Private Investigator's license in the old days. Personal bodyguards are licensed to use maximum force only in the event their clients are in immediate physical danger. Without arrest authority they must call local Private Police Forces or Security Forces to take prisoners.
A variation of personal bodyguards, these are Solos hired to provide security and protection for a neighborhood. Protectors "patrol the beat" of their area, dealing with threats as they turn up. Freelance Police have arrest authority, as granted by the neighborhood they work for. They sometimes have holding cells, but more often as not remand prisoners to the local Hall of Justice/Security Facility.
The Night City Transit Corporation (NCTC) provides bus services on most major city thoroughfares. NCART (Night City Area Rapid Transit), a public corporation with some private (rad: Corporate) funding, has mostly been submerged under several hundred feet of salt water with the collapse of the Night City water table, but there are plans to rebuild the flooded sections above ground and extend the new monorail to cover the growing suburban areas of: North Oak, New Westbrook, Pacifica, Heywood, and Watson.
- Transport: Night City Metro
The local airport, handling both domestic and international flights. If there were any. Once again, the chaos of the War disrupted most regular transit, private jets and aerodynes exist only for the wealthy. As part of the reclamation of the City, plans are underway to establish an orbital spaceplane/delta massdriver launch site on Morro Rock (A volcanic batholith, it is the most geologically stable area in the entire region).
Night City is on State Highway 828, which runs east to connect to I-5. Ground transit to San Francisco is about 4 hours (due to road gang activity and bad roads to LA is about 6 hours.
The most reliable transportation in or out of Night City comes via the services of the Nomad Clans. Individual Clans sponsor heavily armed convoys to cities along the Coast, the West, and even to the edges of the New United States. These convoys, often made up of over a hundred vehicles ranging in size from giant multifamily Kombis to small armed escort cycles, are capable of fending off even the most determined road-gangs and rogue mercenary groups. Sea-based Clans have commandeered everything from abandoned luxury liners to gigantic container ships and pressed them into service; these are also a reliable way to get out of Night City via the sea lanes.
- Transport: By Air and Even Space
Need to travel faster? Nomad Clans now control a sizable percentage of the Aerozep (modern cargo blimps) traffic around the region and overseas, usually backed up by satellite snub fighters and AVs. There are few actual commercial jets or other winged aircraft available (too expensive to operate), but if you're really in a hurry, there are an assortment of ex-ESA (European Space Agency) or Orbital Highrider pilots commanding their own suborbital scram-jets, like the legendary Han Solo, these "Deltajocks" go out of their way to avoid legal entanglements and will move any cargo (including you) for the right price.
