Zugbrücken

Matthew Stewart

A Zugbrücken is a megastructure around which certain powerful Gehen kingdom's economy can thrive and whose upkeep require that of a powerful kingdom to afford. Each is a place the plain or savanna has been extended with incredible engineering and brute feats of magical might to create a mile wide grass covered passage where natural migratory herds, the flocks of Shäfers, or the herds managed by Elchreiters can cross the the massive rivers in Gehen Ort. The Zugbrücken are artificially created to control the natural migrations of the beast which feed the Gehen Volki themselves and fuel their economy, and as a main means to exact a toll tax which maintains the kingdoms which in turn maintain the Zugbrücken.

Purpose / Function

To allow massive herds and flocks of grazing beasts ranging in size from sheep and gazelle to triceratops and elephants, along with their predators to form migratory patterns to use this massive hill-sized bridges across rivers too wide, deep, and swift to swim without exhaustion. This allows harvesting of wild herds and population control of predators to encourage herd growth, along with taxation of nomadic Shäfers and Elchreiters.

Architecture

These structures are engineer to cross spans of a two fifths of a mile at the shortest, up two a bit over half a mile as the furthest, being able so support several hundred-head herds of gargantuan beasts without even cracking. They are covered with several feet of soil and grass is deliberately tended and irrigated but private herds are allow on a pass through policy only, enforced by the kingdom tax collectors. The greenery is to attract wild game and make it a natural stopping point on migratory paths following greener pastures.
Even when the water is at its highest there is barely a 120' clearance under the middle of the Zugbrücken, allowing ships whose masts and hull are above water level no more than that passage.

Type

Megastructure, Land based

Parent Location

Gehen Ort