Motoring Culture on Aren in the New Day

This section describes the state of the automobile on Aren during the late portion of the era of the New Day, around the time of the The Conditional Continuation.

Arindell

In Arindell Proper the average citizen has just one type of car: the Glowing Motors Verret. This will be the only car owned and driven by 99% of the population. Because of Arindell's location, importing hydrocarbon fuels of any kind is a costly prospect, so any scenario where electricity can be used is taken advantage of.

Arindell has no large trucks. A system of electrically-run freight trains moves large loads all over the city. Smaller cargo is moved around on transit vans which run on hydrogen fuel cells. Hydrogen is supplied by Lieber Dam, which produces considerably more power than the city requires. The city busses also run entirely on hydrogen. For a very small subset of the population, there do exist hydrogen-burning cars. These usually have a hydrogen-burning internal combustion engine which drives electric motors to turn the wheels. While efficient, the technology is much more expensive than the ubiquitous Verret, and provides no real benefits beyond the ability to drive faster than everyone else. There are also a small number of gasoline-burning cars in the city, but these are primarily museum exhibits or collectors items belonging to the very wealthy.

A small number of rechargeable all-electric cars are also available, but these offer many downsides while costing substantially more than a Verret. As such this is mostly limited to technology-demonstrators or one-off conversions.

Sun's Beacon

Sun's Beacon provides an interesting dichotomy. The Verret is still ubiquitous for the same reasons as in Arindell - they are small, cheap, require next to no maintenance, and in general provide a hassle-free way to get around for the average person. Being an important trading hub, the importation of hydrocarbon or fossil fuels is considerably more practical, and thus provides a greater array of options. Sun's Beacon lacks Arindell's abundant supply of cheap electricity, so hydrogen vehicles and electric trains are an uncommon sight. The Sun's Beacon Metro does run on electricity, but for moving goods around the use of diesel tractor trailers is still the preferred method. An above-ground rail network using diesel locomotives can also be found. For smaller deliveries of goods, diesel and occasionally gasoline-powered transit vans are preferable. Some of these have also been converted into people carriers, and are generally preferred over the Verret-Estate due to their higher top speeds and better over-all performance. This is typically seen in hired vehicles and shuttle-services, though a few privately-owned variants can be found. Typical gas-powered cars imported from off-world can be seen, but these are extremely costly to maintain owing to no local infrastructure for them.

Burners

A very uniquely Sun's Beacon vehicle is a machine called colloquially a "burner". This is either a custom-built chassis or a modified Verret, where the nuclear battery is replaced by a gas-powered engine. The basic components from the engine are taken from the transit vans, and then modified with either hand-built or otherwise repurposed parts. The result is a gas-powered automobile. Burners exist in a sort of legal grey-area. Officially they cannot be regarded as "cars" and are thus exempt from the road tax, but also unable to be insured. The cars are expected to meet de facto safety standards for headlights, indicators, etc. The authorities won't prosecute someone simply for owning or driving a burner, but the general consensus tends to be "if you own a burner, don't have an accident".

The burners exist out of an odd blend of necessity and ingenuity. While a Verret is certainly inexpensive (costing around 5,000 wingbeats in N.D. 515), the fact that they only run for five years brings the total cost of ownership to 1,000 wingbeats a year. A "burner", however, not counting the cost of gasoline, can be maintained for much less by a decently-skilled mechanic and last considerably longer(on the order of decades). Most of the upkeep costs come in the form of labor-intensive maintenance, something the typical owner can afford to do themselves. Burners are the car of choice for the impoverished who may only use the vehicle once or twice a month to drive to the store. It's also typically customary to never formally sell a burner, it is instead traded or given away when its owner no longer needs it.

Burners have also become popular with a unique subculture in Sun's Beacon. The ubiquitous Verret cannot be improved in any way, and effectively any after-market modifications other than shedding weight will only reduce the performance. Burners, on the other hand, can be endlessly tinkered with and modified, tuned, and upgraded. This makes modifying and racing them a popular activity, especially in the lower-income districts.

Component Sources

Because complete gas-powered cars are simply not manufactured anywhere on Aren, getting parts can be tricky. Importation from off-world is an option, but too expensive for the typically lower-class practitioners. Used but workable exotic parts can be bought on the secondary market from Modia. After that, burner-builders source components from anywhere they can. Lawmowers and piston-engined aircraft are popular sources. This is all part of the spirit of the culture, which effectively runs on ingenuity.

The free-market economy has also stepped in. Consumables like break fluid, engine oil, and spark plugs, which must be imported, are bought in bulk and sold at various shops. There is even a cottage industry of buying used gasoline-powered cars off-world and importing them for sale. The economics of this transaction are challenging; the car has to be mechanically very sound and capable of modification while also being very cheap. Transporting through the GATE creates another cost. Its simply not profitable enough for corporations to get involved, but can pay very well for a savy individual.

Racing

Of course, after the utility-aspect of running these dodgy cars comes the fun. There's no way to modify a Verret to make it faster, but burners can be tinkered with endlessly and fitted with all manner of add-ons to improve performance. This has led to a thriving amateur racing scene complete with city-sponsored events. Its not uncommon late at night to see the police block off streets to create impromptu drag strips, and many departments operate their own burners as part of community outreach.

Burn-Sectors

Burn-Sector is the name given to rich participants in the sport. Anyone with money could fairly easily buy a performance-tuned car off-world and completely dominate the event. However, as it is primarily a lower-class activity, doing so is highly frowned upon. Such cars are typically called "burn-sectors" as are their owners, and they are typically not welcome at events. Only the larger, formal events with paid entry and cash prizes allow burn-sectors, and then they are typically put into a separate class.

Modia

Being Gudersnipe Foundation-controlled, Modia is dominated by the Verret. Car-carrying trains are preferred for long-distance trips, though the region does include a network of motorways. Like Arindell, Modia uses hydrogen-powered transit vans for making small-scale deliveries, but also uses diesel trucks to move anything that can't be sent by rail. Owing to its off-world ties, many strange and exotic cars can also be seen on the streets, though these are largely toys for the wealthy. Enough gasoline-powered car components are imported through Modia to supply the burner-culture in Sun's Beacon.