PCBaller World/Montana

This page will be dedicated to mostly statistics and projects by Montana (and even the country's tallest and farthest-fetched shit yet), also known as the Republic of Montana, Greater Montana, Afungrad II, Animal Cruelty Capital, and Greater Illinois, Mild Flavor. Its large population capacity is mainly achieved by the large numbers of suburban and urban cities built close to major interstates (but that isn't enough).

"Montana's system does not represent my exact personal beliefs due to numerous compromises and treaties made with other nations. - Afun "

Minor Information

 * Driving Side: Right (universal, no exceptions)
 * Measurement System: SI/Metric
 * Date format: Various (DD/MM/YYYY or MM/DD/YYYY)

2024-2026
During 2024, large numbers of liberals and social justice/progressive activists began to immigrate in groves to the states of Montana and Wyoming from Colorado and California, and the states began to rapidly shift left. During the 2024 elections, the governments of Montana and Wyoming were nearly fully replaced with liberals and Democrats. At the same time, Kamala Harris rose to the presidency in Washington, DC. Even though there was much civil unrest and economic turmoil after that election, Montana and Wyoming were staying strong.

2027-Early 2029
Then there was the Great Collapse. After that, the states of South Dakota, Montana, and Wyoming declared themselves to be fully independent countries. South Dakota underwent a schism, separating it into west and east portions. The eastern portion would eventually become a part of Minnesota while the western portion would become a part of Montana. The states of Montana and Western South Dakota voluntarily fused into one, with Helena as the capital. Later on, a group of reactionary refugees from Texas, combined with Montana's political old guard as well as many disenchanted conspiracy theorists, conspired a raid upon the governments of Cheyenne and Helena. In late 2028/2029, the groups raided Cheyenne, and they overthrew the local government. The Bartonian movement (discussed later)Many of these raiders, appalled at the failure of the US government, became sympathetic to race theory and anarchism. From there, they moved up to Helena, where they conducted a violent and bloody raid. 90% of the Helenan government officials were killed in the process. Both Cheyenne and Helena were taken over by these mobs. Afterwards, the couped governments of Helena and Cheyenne (Montana and Wyoming) made an agreement to fuse into one state. Cheyenne was evacuated, and the city became a slum (or a ghetto, if you prefer to call it that). Helena was the official capital of the new state, also called Montana-Wyoming at the time.

Mid 2029
Okay, this is where the fun begins. It is only April of 2029. A team of corporate explorers from further east, appalled by the cataclysm that occurred here over the last year, decided to launch their own cleansing raid. Backed by a few Illinoisan troop units, the corporates launched their own raid upon Helena. They received the support of the Chicagoan government, which declared a small-scale war on the government of Montana-Wyoming in Helena in order to coup it. Illinois and the troop units won the war and cleaned out most of the raiders. The Illinoisan government backed out while the trooper units decided to make a compromise with the remaining raiders. They established a libertarian conservative capitalist government in this compromise, as well as banning all abortion procedures west of the 110th degree of longitude to the west. It was already June 2029 at this point. Two college graduates, Afunhumaninter (who studied and graduated college in Michigan even after the collapse), Crishoh Achtoel (who studied and graduated college in Colorado), and JoeyFloppa (who studied and graduated college in Florida) were three honorary figures who came to Helena with the movement and helped greatly with the raid (except Crishoh Achtoel, he was mainly an observer). A vote was held whether Montana should fuse with Greater Illinois at this point or not. It was nearly a tie, and Crishoh Achtoel managed to convince enough people to become sovereign rather than fuse with Illinois (he had a general disdain of the Illinoisan government as a whole). On 16 June, 2039 (yes, it was scheduled to happen then), Montana-Wyoming was declared sovereign from Greater Illinois, and the state renamed to just Montana (from Montana-Wyoming). This day is a national holiday in Montana even to this day. Over the next few days, some of these three people's friends entered the high positions within the Helenan government while many individuals from the evangelical, Austrian-school, and anti-authoritarian movements (some remnants of the old raiders as well as Illinoisan immigrants) began filling lower-level seats and internships within the government. Afunhumaninter, Joeyfloppa, and Oceanclouds became president, vice president, and house speaker of the Montanan government, respectively.

Late 2029-2035
Since Crishoh Achtoel was distinct from Afun and Joey in the respect that he opposed the Illinoisan institution east, he has normally opposed many of the founding philosophies of Greater Illinois, such as efficiency and order. From 2030 onward there have been talks of a west-east split. At this time, a new highway from I-94 to MT-47 was constructed, and it was named Secondary Highway 580 (or S-580 for short, you'll see that later) as it was apart of Montana's Secondary Numbered Highway System (this system existed even before the collapse). This was to serve as the main roadway for a new city that was going to be built in the case of a West-East schism. The Western Montanans were in favor of open expression, aesthetics over functionality, and strict environmentalism; they preferred many of Crishoh Achtoel' policies compared to those of Afun and JoeyFloppa. On the other hand, the Eastern Montanans, heavily influenced by Greater Illinois and the LFA, were industrialized very quickly. These people supported lenient environmentalism, social norms against general slow social development and transgenderism, and functionality over aesthetics; these people were more in support of Afun and Joey than of Crishoh Achtoel. This cultural divide widened with the ever-accelerating rate of technological advencement, the influence of Greater Illinois and LFA on the east (especially near I-90 and I-94), and the sharp apparent disappearance of ruralism as a lifestyle.

Advanced CRISPR/Gene Editing
Genetic modification within Montana is extremely common. Over 99% of foods are grown GMOs, but pesticides are used less frequently than in modern America. GMOs are used to make plants insect resistant, vitamin-rich, larger during harvest season, and to perform many functions stated here (some plants are made simply to create toxic chemicals en masse, e.g. resiniferatoxin).

The most genetically modified organisms in Montana are farm animals. Cows, pigs, and chickens are mostly (if not all) genetically modified organisms. They may result in an increase in flavorants in meat, naturally produced vitamins, or even larger size (plus all the hormones). These genomes are top-secret within Montana, and only select countries or states (looking at you, Greater Illinois) possess copies of them.

As of 2035, Montana has engineered into existence bacteria capable of accelerated photosynthesis, converting some metal oxides into oxygen, and even producing specific chemicals from their components.

Asteroid Spectroscopy
The Republic of Montana has special telescopes placed into orbit around the Earth in order to scan distant asteroids in the inner asteroid belt using laser spectroscopy. With this, the spacecraft can determine the composition of the asteroids, and sell the information to asteroid miners (specifically to Greater Illinois) and collect large commissions from them (usually anywhere from 1% to 10%), earning Montana hundreds of billions if not trillions of dollars.

Montana has been a leading producer of platinum and palladium, until the genesis of asteroid mining and spectroscopy.

Research into Energy
Even though Montana is powered by nuclear fusion based on the 1H/4He process (proton chain fusion), there have been research projects dedicated to harvesting energy from triple-alpha, quadruple-alpha, and quark fusion. Even seemingly magical or mystical methods are being researched into their validity with the intention of harvesting magic.

Space Program
As the Montanan/ARI empire gets ever larger, the advancements on other planets have boomed in prominence and number. With the recent news of the American (fully self-sustaining) colony being formed in space, the Montanan influence has expanded with it, as they are a portion of the new colony. They have at least a small presence on anywhere between 70 and 98 percent of bodies 200 kilometers and larger within the orbit of Eris. Montana has exceptionally strong and notable (and even self-sustaining) colonies on a few bodies. Let us look at them.
 * Earth's Moon. As this is one of the first celestial bodies an Earthling will take control of and see, it is just practical to explore and talk about this one first. The Moon base was one of the first bases to be made, and there are many large storehouses of asteroid-mined minerals there. The escape velocity there is relatively low (just a little under 3 kilometers per second) meaning that a spacecraft launch from the Moon would be significantly cheaper than one from Earth or Mars. The ARI base there is only 28% owned by Montana with the other 72% being (mostly) Greater Illinois and Byzantium. The Moon base has tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of Montanans living on it. The base is worth trillions of dollars in itself and is visible from even 1,000 kilometers above the lunar surface. It is one of the three celestial bodies to have animal processing/production facilities. There are approximately 40 artificial habitats in orbit around the Moon that are at least 40% owned by Montana. The outposts are powered by nuclear fusion from the hydrolysis of the lunar ice at the poles.
 * Mars. Mars is obviously another major checkpoint in human space colonization. With a mediocre escape velocity, prices for launching off are somewhat higher than that of leaving the Moon but less than that of leaving Earth. The outposts are primarily composed of researchers and astrobiologists studying the conditions needed for any form of extremophile life to survive on the unadulterated, unprotected, and cold Martian surface. The planet has about 125 artificial habitats in orbit around it that are at least 40% Montana-owned. There are about 12,500 Montanans on Mars. Some of the artificial habitats have factory farms and abattoirs inside for supplying meat to the colony.
 * Ceres. Montana has put an unusually large effort into the Ceres colony. As a major outpost in the Inner Asteroid Belt, the Ceres colony is a rapidly growing, highly developed, and lucrative business. Nearly 80 PPM of the colony is owned by stock-holding individuals. The colony is an astonishing 60% Montana-owned, with 35% being owned by Illinois and 5% being owned by Byzantium. The Ceres colony is, save the lack of metals on the planet, fully self-sustainable. It has over 250,000 members and 15 artificial habitats orbiting it. These habitats are dedicated to meat production as well as human habitation with the purpose of emulating Earth-like gravity with centripetal forces. The base alone is becoming more and more self-sufficient, it may even become a mini-me of the extant ARI space colony. Since Ceres has much water and ammonia ice, these can be cracked with the purpose of gathering hydrogen for nuclear fusion plants to power the colonies. The colony takes advantage of vertical crop farming in order to feed the populace, produce oxygen from CO2, and feed the animals, which have been CRISPR'd to grow in an extremely short timeframe, similar to broiler chickens.
 * Europa. Europa is a weird one. Both Byzantium and Illinois have a large joint presence with Montana here, as Montana owns only 40% of the colony. There is a fuckton (aka literally the entire planet at this point) of water ice here to crack and fuse, just like clockwork. Europa is a top provider of condensed liquified hydrogen fuel, an industry worth hundreds of billions of dollars at this point. Oxygen is also in no short supply. The colony has thousands of members. The colony once broke into two, with the auxiliary colony having only about 700 members (all Western Montanans). Crop growing even exists here, just not factory farming (not just yet.) There are about five artificial habitats orbiting here.
 * Titan. The methane capital of the solar system nvm that title belongs to Uranus . Titan's colony is able to generate large amounts of helium, elemental carbon, and fusion energy. Food is grown, water is harvested, and ships take off.
 * Venus. Now this is a bit sci-fi-ish, but whatever. You're reading Montana's page right now, not Puerto Rico's or North Germany's. Venus has a surface pressure of 92 atmospheres and a surface temperature of 480 degrees Celsius, hotter than any Solar System object save the sun. Large floating cities, preferably interlinked prisms, will float about 50 kilometers, an altitude at which the dense carbon atmosphere of Venus is as low as Earth's surface atmospheric pressure. Thus, standard Terran air acts like a lifting gas in the thick carbon Gehenna that is Venus's atmosphere. The current setup on Venus holds 80,000 residents, and the colony produces food and water. Water is either brought to the colony or mined from the small concentration of it in the Venusian atmosphere. Since the upper Venusian atmosphere contains a significant amount of sulfuric acid vapor, that can be cracked into sulfur trioxide and water, the latter of which can either be consumed or cracked further for nuclear fusion. If it is economically feasible, sulfur trioxide can be cracked further into sulfur dioxide/elemental sulfur, providing the habitats with oxygen.
 * Proxima Centauri b. Greater Solar System jokes aside, Proxima Centauri b is one of the closest exoplanets to the Solar System, clocking in at 4.3 light years (40.7 trillion km) from the Sun. This exoplanet orbits a red dwarf star, Proxima Centauri (also one of the closest stars to Earth, save for the sun). Some warp technologies built with the collaboration of the entire ARI may have been built with the ability to travel at 520 c, traversing the distance to the star in slightly over three days. The P Centauri b colony is 18% owned by Montana. This colony is intentionally self-sufficient, as the distance to the star is hundreds of thousand of times greater than any interplanetary distance within the Solar System. More advanced triple-/quadruple-alpha fusion or quark fusion may be used to generate the vast quantities of power needed to power such a colony in the case of a lack of hydrogen or water. Water may be present on the planet. The number of colonists is numbering in the thousands at this point.

What about the belts?
Artificial habitats are being built all of the time in the inner asteroid belt, and hundreds have been finished. They usually take the form of a Stanford torus with an interior similar to a cluster of geometrical cities (you'll read about those later).

Capsaicin/Resiniferatoxin
Montana is the leading producer of concentrated capsaicin and resiniferatoxin in North America, using heavily genetically modified plants and chemical processes to produce ever-larger amounts of these chemicals in use for pepperspray and weaponry (and trading) than before at an ever-lower cost. Montana's gene-modification and weaponry production departments have genetically modified Euphorbia resinifera plants to increase per-mass resiniferatoxin production hundredfold. Manufacturing at most hundreds of tons of these chemicals per year, these chemicals are regularly traded in with partners such as Quebec and central Greater Illinois (who in turn trades it in with partners). While a jalapeno may have 9,000 chemical heat measures (or Scoville units), pure capsaicin ranks to approximately 16,000,000 units while pure resiniferatoxin ranks to approximately 16,000,000,000 units.

The Aesthetics Problem
The "Aesthetics Problem" is a nickname given to the governmental softban on the lack of a specified aesthetical design (with the exception of prisons) due to the passage of a specific bill from the House of Representatives; it was passed on 21 February, 2036. In other words, buildings are required to be aesthetically pleasing (to some extent). Most factories and industrial buildings are built with a brutalist aesthetic in order to keep the costs low. Most other buildings are built with aesthetics in mind (not completely, but are more aesthetically pleasing than let's say buildings in Chicago, IL). The "Aesthetics Problem" has slightly increased the cost of building and the cost of living, but innovators have managed to create aesthetically pleasing buildings that are mostly functional.

The Industrial Channel
The "Industrial Channel" is a portion of Interstates 90 and 65. The portion in I-90 starts in Bozeman, MT and goes to the junction with I-65 at Gary, IN. From there, the Industrial Channel will continue down to the interstate's junction with I-70 in Indianapolis, IN. The Channel has an extra lane on either side of the roadway (either that or the people are planning to build an extra lane on either side of the roadway, as it may not be finished). The Channel is notable for having many industrial centers, factory farms, airports, cheap aesthetically unpleasing homes, and abattoirs near it—shipment costs to Greater Illinois and the LFA are slightly lower. The northernmost 50 kilometers of Interstate 25 are surrounded by the robust Montanan industry sector.

The Vegan Problem
The "Vegan Problem" is a perceived problem in industrial areas near the Industrial Channel, where numerous factory farms and slaughterhouses are located. Many exits on industrial I-90 lead to slaughterhouses or factory farms, and these roads often face the issue of overcrowding by disruptive activists. Hostile architecture and surveillance have been implemented en masse to discourage the movement of these activists who intend on blocking the flow of traffic. Many factory farms and slaughterhouses are located near sheriff/police stations (or even military bases if they happen to be close to I-90) for this reason. In extreme cases, caravans of trucks and buses carrying animals for slaughter can be followed by teams of police cars.

Language
English is the primary language of Montana, with 85% of residents having it as their first language. The Russian language is in running second, with 13% of the population having it as an L1 and 70% of those with a second language having it as an L2. Spanish, French, German, and Ukrainian are uncommon as L1's in Montana, with up to 20% having one of those four as second languages. English is the second language of 5% of those who have one. All official documents are written in English, even though both English and Russian are spoken in big meetings (the former is significantly more common for obvious reasons).

Over 98% of the population knows the Latin script (as used in English), with anywhere from 70% to 90% knowing the Russian Cyrillic script.

The Montanan accent is known for the ability to pronounce /ɨ/ and the ability to articulate /tʲ/, /dʲ/, and /sʲ/ mostly (but not completely) like a native Russian would; the average Montanan accent may struggle with /w/. The Montanan accent in the West may have a decreased ability to pronounce /w/ and an increased ability to make the /vʲ/, /bʲ/, and /pʲ/ sounds. On the other hand, the Montanan accent in the East may have a decreased ability to make the /ɨ/, /sʲ/, and /dʲ/ sounds, usually having little to no problem with /w/.

West vs East
There is a cultural divide between the western side of Montana and the eastern side of Montana. The West has a rather high concentration of Russian speakers while Russian is spoken less than average in the Eastern portion. Cost of living is approximately 30% higher in western Montana, as houses take longer to build and are costlier to build/repair.

The amount of effort put into aesthetically pleasing building within the Western Montana is often high, driving up costs and building times, even if the functionality of said building is impaired. Buildings built in Eastern Montana tend to be rather aesthetically unpleasing (most of them usually meet the bare minimum, except houses, which are more aesthetically pleasing than most buildings there), even though they usually have increased functionality. Buildings built in a strictly geometrical or even honeycomb-like manner are somewhat more common for non-residential buildings than in the West.

The rural lifestyle is a relatively major factor here in the West, with urban/industrial cities being uncommon (just somewhat less common than in the east but whatever). Ruralism and ranch life are virtually nonexistent in the east, with over 99% of the meat produced by the East being raised in factory farms. The attempted violent crime rate is nearly 60% higher here than in the West, even though police and military being very common.

60% of damage costs from extreme weather events are in Western Montana, while factory-related diseases and deaths are nearly three times as prevalent in the east.

Suburbs, upper-class neighborhoods, lower-class neighborhoods, and industrial centers are found in both halves of Montana. Suburbs are equally common in both halves, as are upper- and lower-class neighborhoods.

Ethical veganism, vegan activism, and violent animal rights protests are all more common in the East than in the West. Nonviolent animal rights protesters, seventh-day Adventists, and dietary vegans are more common in the West.

The space in between Western and Eastern Montana (Midwestern Montana) is the least population-dense area in Montana. Many land-based telescopes and military bases, as well as ranches, exist here, due to how relatively desolate it is. There are no urban cities here, as this is the northern end of the rocky mountains (pretty much). Suburbs are rare to find.

Schism?
Since the early 2030s, there has been talk of a West-East schism due to conflicting interests between model politicians and subregions of Montana. A hypothetical schism would result in all land east of the 110°W longitudinal demarcation line belonging to East Montana (under the government of New Cheyenne); the land west of the line would belong to West Montana, based in Helena. East Montana would stay as a close trade partner of GI, and it would be run by Afun and JoeyFloppa as president and VP. On the other hand, West Montana would be run by Crishoh Achtoel and Toru Kitakaze as president and vice president, respectively. Western Montana may or may not break away from the ARI, breaking away from which would break their ties with Greater Illinois and the LFA. Even though this is somewhat unlikely, Western and Eastern Montana would still be distinct socio-economic and cultural groups anyway.

Megalopolises
Even though much of Montanan industry is built near highways, sometimes megalopolises are built. Both West and East Montana have metropolises, except that they are built for very different purposes. They are simply large clusters of highly developed cities that aren't confined to the eight kilometers away from some bigass road like I-90 or some shit.

In Western Montana, megalopolises are usually large clusters of suburban, semi-urban, and urban cities, with geometric cities being rare. The Western megalopolises are usually commercial and residential, with businesses being built with aesthetics in mind. Some of the aesthetics may include Victorian or Renaissance-era architecture as well as dark academia. Functionality is rarely top priority over in the West. Greater Helena is an example of this.

On the other hand, Eastern Montanan megalopolises feature residential, commercial, and industrial sectors. Geometrical cities may or may not be common here. Aesthetics are nearly completely mitigated, only keeping a bare minimum to comply with national laws. New Cheyenne is an example of this.

Renovated Bozeman
Bozeman has been expanded from a mere 49.5 km2 to approximately 65 km2 Industrialists moved here as well in large amounts before the rush to fill up the Billings/New Cheyenne area. Bozeman was the first Montanan city to switch to deuterium (and eventually basic hydrogen) fusion for at least 80% of its energy supply.

The Megalopolis
The Bozeman megalopolis is an approximately 8,000 km2 area approximately centered on Bozeman. Finished in 2038, this was the first megalopolis to be raised in the new Montanan Territory. Since a large number of small cities and towns were already there, they were all expanded to fit the entire megalopolis. They were fused into a series of larger cities. Bozeman, Belgrade, and Livingston are not renamed. New Sky, a small city near the edge of the megalopolis, is considered a part of the megalopolis, and its name was not changed. Manhattan was merged into Belgrade. There are a total of 11 cities in the megalopolis, being:
 * Bozeman
 * Belgrade
 * Livingston
 * Clarkson-Lombard
 * New Sky
 * Hoffman
 * Red Bluff
 * Patterson
 * Sedan
 * Harrison
 * Voston

New Cheyenne, the City
A new city is being built east of Billings. Its western border will be at most 30 km east of Billings. This city is a large hub for industry, including Montana's weapons industry and housing industry. The city will have a few suburbs for housing and general suburban life. Hexagonally-shaped (or honeycomb) buildings are a major sight in New Cheyenne. The city envelops S-580, and more is being built north of it (and south of I-94). The city is not even finished yet; it'll be awesome once it's done. Large quantities of hostile architecture will be utilized in places, especially around places that process or sell significant quantities of animals, meat, or animal products (for example, Stokoboinia Novovoshayenna, sometimes called Bergen-Cheyenne, named after the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, that place takes in hundreds of truckloads per day and has an almost overdone amount of pepperspray cannons and spikes as well as over-electrified barbed wire) or geometrical cities (even inside of them).

New Cheyenne is a primarily corporate project that was thought of for the purpose of having one large industry-oriented and technology-oriented region in the eastern section of Montana. The city is to have a large residential population as well as a larger population (especially of factory workers and upper-class migrants) than Billings (only 400,000 people as of 2035). It will even serve as a backup capital for Montana in the case of a West-East schism. This city may even extend south of I-90 to US-87, if you know what that is. When New Cheyenne is fully built, it should occupy the entire triangle of I-90, I-94, and MT-47, making an area of slightly more than 1,355 km2, boasting nearly twelve times the area of Billings in 2023 (or about eight times greater than the large urban metropolises built by Montanan corporations post-collapse). It'll be only slightly larger than Los Angeles by area, per 2023.

The city is predicted to be fully finished from 2040 to 2046. As of 2039, the city has ~175,000 people and covers about 1,000 km2. People are moving into the new city at an alarming rate, as the project is becoming well-known among Montanans and other people in the USA.

New Cheyenne is also more dense and tightly packed than most cities in Montana. This is what makes the city different from most cities of its era.

New Cheyenne, the Megalopolis
Okay, here is the fun part. Other cities are being built between MT 47 and MT 59 by these large corporations. When the megalopolis is fully built, it will have an area of over 13,000 km2, being made up of many cities (and being ten times bigger than New Cheyenne itself) once the 16 component cities are done being built. Roads already exist in these areas, but they will be insufficient when the cities are fully built. There will even be military bases within this area. Just like in New Cheyenne, hostile architecture will be present en masse.

This megalopolis itself is projected to be finished between 2042 and 2075. It is projected to have enough homes for tens if not hundreds of millions of people. It will be visible from space during the day. Suburbs will be present in pockets within the urban landscape, but the rural parts will be fully removed from this area.

The following cities will be apart of the megalopolis:
 * Devyanostopol (Девяностополь)
 * Arctus-Schelmus (Арктус-Щелмус)
 * Webster (Вебстер)
 * Henderson (Хендерсон)
 * Novolov (Новолов)
 * Derelikterius (Дереликтериус)
 * Zhopolov (Жополов)
 * Svernistopol (Свернистополь)
 * Novolog-Alga (Новолог-Алга)
 * Shveristov (Шверистов)
 * Welmerus (Велмерус)
 * Ulstera (Улстэра)
 * Moralenyy (Мораленый)
 * Yektoniy (Ектоний)
 * New Cheyenne (Новый-Шайенн)
 * Seviergorod (Севергород)

Arterial Highway: Secondary Route 580
The new highway, S-580, serves as one of the city's main arterial roadways, with its western terminus on I-94 (at a spot in Yellowstone County ~12 km from its own western terminus with I-90) and its eastern terminus on MT-59 in Custer County (54.6 km north of its intersection with US 212). The highway has a full length of 211.48 kilometers. Rider Rd. (or road 85 on a map), a road that S-580 goes through, is upgraded to the same lane count and freeway status as S-580 itself; this renovated section is about 1.61 km long. From here, it intersects with MT-47, about 6.5 km north of its own southern terminus at I-90. The section of the highway in New Cheyenne (from I-94 to MT-47) will be approximately 57.27 km long. S-580 is six lanes wide (three lanes per direction, and it has a speed limit of 110 kph (only 100 kph on its easternmost 3 km); the road narrows down to 4 lanes (2 per direction) on its westernmost 4 kilometers. There are no traffic lights on the S-580 freeway itself; all intersections are built using ribbon-like sets of off-ramps and interchanges. S-580 (Rus: Второе Шоссе 580, В-580) is built to be completely bilingual as all of its signs accommodate both English and Russian languages with equal font sizes with no exception.

The highway has many spur routes to serve different cities. For example, all secondary highways 581 to 599 are designated New Cheyenne highways. Odd numbers are generally north-south highways while even numbers are generally west-east highways; the numbers get larger for more northern or eastern highways.

Our Opinions on Animal Cruelty
The Manifesto AES-256 ECB. This is one block of text.

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Bartonian Movement
The Bartonian movement is a Christian religious movement that originated in western Montana.

The Bartonian movement, founded by Alexander Bartone, is a Protestant Christian fundamentalist religious movement that emerged out of the Seventh-day Adventist church in 2028. It started as a group of ethical vegans within the Adventist church (a denomination that usually supports vegetarianism) that assimilated many fundamentalist points to explain the American Collapse, including blaming the events on the abortion industry and the acceptance of LGBT. Later in 2028, the movement officially split off from the Adventist church, led by Bartone himself. The movement helped form the Party for National Revival in 2028; it was later banned in 2034. Even with the party banned, the Bartonian movement lives on.

Bartonian theology is (obviously) very similar to seventh-day Adventism. It supports ethical veganism as opposed to just vegetarianism (maybe not as far as PETA but same idea). The movement is also notoriously anti-LGBT, stating that sodomy should be recriminalized as a felony. The movement isn't as anti-abortion as many pulpit fundamentalists are. The movement also approves of the use of violence in some situations. Some sects within movement also see Greater Illinois and  Indonesia as joint manifestations of the beast mentioned in Revelation 17 (Ofc the Pope is the false prophet, they're revisionist Adventists so...). It also supports the enforcement of recent creationism in public and even private schools. It also believes that Sunday worship is a sign of Catholic infiltration and that Saturday is the only valid day to worship on.

An estimated ~12,500 people follow Bartonian theology. It has been described by many people as a cult within Christianity. Loose connections have been found between the 2000-man slaughterhouse raid and the Bartonian movement.

"June 16" Culture
June 16 is a national holiday in Montana, as the country itself was formed on June 16, 2029; it was a scheduled formation, meaning that this date was planned (mainly be Afunhumaninter). June 16 is celebrated mainly with wild parties, rough drinking, music festivals, and/or fireworks scenes. The holiday is often celebrated on the week of the day or on the day and the three days after it. For the governmental officials, they celebrate the day and all of the 3-5 days after it in Hall 108 (a nationally famous luxury hotel very near the junction of S-418 and S-580, you'll see what those mean later); about 100-300 people join these parties. For the two weeks before 6/16: these are what usually happen:
 * The meat industry increases its production by anywhere from 20% to 110%.
 * Alcohol and liquor stores get nearly empty.
 * Concert and music festival prices increase by a factor of 1.5x to even 12x, IF the concert is scheduled around 6/16. People may be paying thousands of dollars in some instances for a single ticket.
 * Luxury hotels (like Hall 108) begin filling up.
 * Individuals may flock in from the LFA, Minnesota, and GI for the purpose of participation. The population will increase by about half a million, but the majority of them end up going back anyway after 6/16.

Now FOR 6/16 itself:
 * About 95% of employees will take the day off. This does not include police, firefighters, or hospital workers.
 * Car accidents, especially around large intersections and interchanges will nearly quadruple (including deaths) due to drunk driving. Traffic jams become nearly six times more prevalent.
 * Fireworks get launched. The firefighting industry gets more work than nearly any other day in the year, save for the Fourth of July.
 * Nearly 0.022-0.037% of the population will end up having alcohol poisoning.
 * Space trips planned to start on the day itself will be postponed to any date between 6/20 and 6/30.

NWI-Montana Border
Montana might have border walls all over, but the wall between Northwest Imperium and Montana is frequently breached by large gangs and bands of criminals. This part of the border is currently being upgraded as the current protection is insufficient to thwart crime and trespassing. The border here is nearly done being upgraded; it'll possibly be done by 2041. Many criminal bases have been made within 15 km of the base, making the nearest 15 km of the NWI-Montana border mostly uninhabitable in the long term, so workers only help construct the wall in the day. Ethical vegan radicals have been sighted here at midnight as the entire area peaks in crime from ~11p to ~7a. Criminal passage is common through the unupgraded portions of the wall.

"Geometrical Cities"
Many of the buildings in New Cheyenne (and a few found in other cities or just along major roads) are geometrically connected in the form of a triangular grid, square grid, hexagonal grid, or a grid of any repeating pattern. These buildings may be standalone buildings or may be massive tall habitats. These tall habitats may be tens (or even hundreds) of meters wide/tall and are built out functionally advantageous and strong materials. Support poles exist inside of the buildings (obviously). These buildings could house living spaces with the same area found in a middle-class house. Each building usually has anywhere from a few to dozens of floors, each one six to eight meters tall. This gives ample space for supports, housing, and business to be built on the inside. The companies that build these often take commissions from whoever/whatever inhabits these massive buildings.

The ground floor is often a massive parking garage that has a small outway to a road or street. Large elevators, water pipes, electrical wires, and ethernet cables run down the middle of the building near its widest support beam. Buildings not fully dedicated to commercial use are usually somewhat spaced to allow the building of small backyards and balconies. Higher floors are smaller than lower floors in order to keep the building from collapsing; thus, residential spaces on higher floors will have larger balconies than lower ones (and the view is also good if there isn't just another building; also, costs are higher up here).

The buildings are somewhat wider at the bottom than at the top. The construction procedures have costed significantly less than they have in the past. The materials used to make the supporting beams (some of them up to meters in diameter) and the external supports are very erosion-resistant and expansion-resistant as well as (relatively) cheap materials mined from outer space. Platinum and iridium are used for the coating of external supports while titanium and heavily reinforced steel are used for the support. Of course the buildings aren't completely hexagonal as they have some efforts put into making them aesthetically pleasing to look at (as compared to just raw metallic bars and beams spiking a hundred meters into the sky). Aesthetical accommodations (like wood and bricks) are usually at most one meter thick, resting on the metallic and cemented supports that give the buildings their durability and functionality.

"Geometrical cities" are often heated and lit to a certain extent (but not too much as to avoid increasing the maintenance costs). Lighting is usually in sync with the outside day/night cycle, using photoelectric nodes to determine day and night.

Geometrical cities are often built in clusters; this is often the reason they are built in shapes that are able to make repeating patterns. Roads may wind between the individual buildings. Each "geometric city" is simply a large prism with a specific cross-sectional shape. The shape is usually a regular polygon, and that will most likely be either a triangle, a square, or a hexagon. Hexagons are the most resource-efficient shape, as less wall material and less road are needed per unit area. In fact, circles are the most efficient shapes in this context, but they cannot be tessellated without the use of stars. Squares are able to make "blocks" out of roads, having one intersection at the shared corner of any two square buildings. Triangles are a strong shape, and they can resist wind and extreme weather events (e.g. tornadoes) somewhat better than the other shapes. Triangular buildings are often used on the borders of clusters of "geometrical cities" for this reason.

The base of each geometric city is often at least 10 meters (for one-lane streets, some areas have two-lane streets, making it 20 meters) away from the neighboring geometric city in order to ensure the passage of roads. The distance is usually the number of lanes times 5 meters. Left-turn lanes are often not present in clusters of geometrical cities. If no road passes between any two geometrical cities, they can often be as close as 2 meters together.

Now you may ask, where the hell are these places? A large number of them are built and being built in the growing town of New Cheyenne. One of the largest suburbs south of downtown New Cheyenne, Zeus (yes, a city named after a Greek god), has a string of square-column geometric cities approximately 2.4 kilometers long and 80 meters thick near Henderson Blvd. (a large S-580 spur that continues south of I-90, named after none other than the president of Greater Illinois himself, also a northern expansion of S-418). There is a small cluster of about twenty 50-meter-edged hexagonal geometric cities in Bozeman as well as an isolated cylindrical 100-meter-radius geometric city in Helena. The largest geometric city is dubbed the Monolith of New Cheyenne as it is a square geometric city that is over half a kilometer wide, and it isn't even done yet; this particular city will have a total of 40 7-meter floors as well as an internal drivable roadway. It is east of the city of New Cheyenne itself; it is only a few hundred meters off of the city's east border at MT-47, making it a part of the New Cheyenne Megalopolis. Of course these aren't the only places these structures are present.

Terraforming of Mars
Much of the CRISPR gene editing done on bacteria is primarily for the eventual purpose of terraforming Mars, which could be started at most 1000 years into the future. Teaming up with LFA, Greater Illinois, and (possibly) Byzantium, Mars will eventually be made a habitable world of its own that can allow a human to live on the surface without the use of a space suit. Mars will be used as a second habitable planet similar to Earth. It will have water, nitrogen, oxygen, (little) carbon dioxide, iron, and an agreeable atmospheric pressure. The planet may have artificial moons built in orbit around Mars (by then many artificial moons will be built around Earth and its moon).

On a side note, we are all unsure whether this is even truly possible, partially possible, or impossible to begin with.

Project Spherewash
"See Mainstream Idea Jingoism." Project Spherewash is a corporate plan to deplatform and eventually eliminate (or "wash out") those who hold flat-Earth beliefs, geocentrism, alternative cosmology, and/or hollow-Earth beliefs across the entire world. The plan has been started, and the first phase is currently being rolled out.

The efforts of these companies will include the vast majority of megacorporations in pretty much every corner of the planet (even those not on good terms with Montana, e.g. Indonesia or Austria). The project will even involve the government of Greater Illinois and other authoritarian regimes to commit cultural genocide on flat-Earthers (besides Russophiles and furries).

National governments that resist Project Spherewash will face some corporate withdrawal and tight corporate sanctions. The goal of this project is to eliminate flat-Earth belief and geocentrism, remember?

Why does Corporate want to do something this great?
This operation is done due to how many flat-Earthers there are all over the world. Even though science education is going strong over here in Montana, other countries might not be as lucky. These flat-Earthers and geocentrists forge plans and schemas to stop large asteroid companies, forcing them to spend billions of dollars yearly in court cases thanks to how powerful large groups of flat-Earthers and geocentrists can be when it comes to libel and misinformation. In order to eliminate these obstacles, they elites, pretty much all billion-dollar corporations, some authoritarian governments, and pretty much every conventional science education agency have come together to devise a plan to eliminate this threat.

Even the vast majority of the populace of sphere-earth adherents are not completely sure whether the entire project should go underway or not. Only time will tell.

Phase 1: The Beginning of the End
Phase 1 is the first phase of Project Spherewash. It is planned to last about ten years, and it will start anytime from 2035 to 2040. In this case, social media will be funded large billions (especially by trillion-dollar asteroid-mining companies and industrial megacorporations) to prohibit the promotion of targeted belief systems across all social networks. Any resistance will be met with either intensive fact-checking, account terminations, or sitewide bans. Links to sites such as FES will be prohibited across sites. Advanced AI technology installed on websites will be used to clean bad posts or even ban users of social networks.

Phase 2: The End?
After social media companies crack down upon target belief systems, the next stage is the dissenters. "Free speech" social networks that have not succumbed to Project Spherewash in Phase 1 will be removed from the majority of search engines. Search engines (e.g. Google or Bing) will remove these links from their search engines. Internet service providers will block any sites that support flat-Earth theory (or even search engines that do not remove such links). The ISP system will be modified as to fully disconnect and isolate such individuals. Any protests, online or physical, will be met with staged forces from those participating in Project Spherewash. This phase is predicted to last anywhere from 20 to 80 years.

Public book-burning ceremonies and rituals will be held. Entire debates will be held between teams of conventional scientists and individual dissenters; they're specifically held in order to turn the wider populace against alt-cosmologies and flat-Earth theory. These debates are staged in order to give the scientists more ground than the flat-Earthers and alternative theorists. 24-hour (or even 48-hour) space trips will be held with anywhere up to a thousand people in each one in an attempt to show visible proof of a spherical Earth to those in it. Armed teams of evangelists (armed to defend themselves) will be sent to areas will abnormally large numbers of flat-Earthers and geocentrists.

Phase 3. The End.
Once phase 3 has been hit, there is no coming back. Once alternative cosmology has been pushed underground almost entirely, the job/housing/auto market will be targeted next. Those who publicly hold alternative cosmology as true will be prohibited from holding jobs with affected companies. Housing or auto will be prohibited for those who haven't given in at this point. Companies that have not succumbed will be removed from search lists. Landlords targeted will be required by contract to prohibit individuals who hold alt-cosmology systems (or even alt-cosmology-friendly businesses) to be true from holding businesses there. Individuals who hold alternative cosmologies will be prohibited from working at schools. Entire public schools will teach strictly conventional cosmologies, with dire penalties put in place against teachers or educators who resist.

Home- and private-schooled children will be targeted as well. Places where young children are held (typically ages 4-6) will face an intensive wave of indoctrination into mainstream cosmology in order to sharply decrease the chances of flat-Earthers being raised. Major news agencies by now will be egging on this wave of mass indoctrination of children as young as preschool age. All levels of schooling starting with kindergarten will have classes intended to saturate children with the conventional narrative of cosmology.

This stage could take up to 100 years to complete.

Phase 4: ???
After all is said and done, the complete removal of alternative cosmology will be performed by natural selection. Over the centuries and millennia that will elapse in the future, alternative beliefs will be washed out of even the underground, and natural selection will perform the bulk of the job of washing out these belief systems among those who still believe them at this point.

Conspiracy Problem
How is Montana complete without its own conspiracy theory problem? In the year 2039, conspiracy-based violence spiked and then started decreasing as many militant groups were sniffed out and exposed. Some of these I cannot post here in detail since they would violate the wiki rules, but you probably know what those will be about. The following are the main offenders.

Greater Illinois NWO/Antichrist
Greater Illinois and the ARI are the medium through which the NWO will be established, and President Bernard Henderson himself is the Antichrist.

GI Wisconsin's Tunnels
You can probably tell what this one will be about.

Animal Genocide
Montana's enormous meat industry is a joint attempt by both Montana and Greater Illinois to increase obesity and incompetence in all of America and the world.

Catholic Church - ARI Synthesis
Self-explanatory. Mainly posited by Seventh-day Adventists. The high numbers of factory farms built are built to provide food to the elites and help submit the global population to the Catholic church and the one world religion.

I90gate
I90gate is a conspiracy theory that Interstate 90 serves as a transit route for much secretive and illegal activity at night. It also posited that the extremely high rate of traffic jams back in 2029 and 2030 were the result of the elites attempting to slow down population growth in Montana; this would allow the elites to perform their illegal duties above ground for longer.

The Collapse Paved the Way for the NWO
Self-explanatory. The collapses of Montana and the USA were pulled off to establish globalism in the world. The USA is seen as a threat to that plan, and ARI is a force of evil.

Geometric Cities Tunnels
Essentially, the geometric "cities" built are all over-ground protrusions of a massive network of tunnels, some of which lead all of the way to Illinois and Indiana. You already know what happens in the tunnels, no need to say.

General Statistics

 * Mean life expectancy at birth: 90.2 (total), 93.4 (female), 87.0 (male)
 * Average Salary: $90,000
 * Unemployment rate: 2.1%
 * Homicide rate: 4.6 per 100,000 per year
 * Terrorism Index (2039/2040): 5.37 (Terrorism Index in 2038/2039 was 6.53)
 * Obesity (BMI>30.0): 38.3%

Energy Production
Numbers are in billions of kilowatt-hours per year. Only applies to Earth (if space were taken into account, numbers would be far higher).
 * Total: 9,872
 * H-He nuclear fusion: 8,135
 * Fossil fuel: 1,025
 * Nuclear fission: 500
 * Wind: 115
 * Solar: 79
 * Hydro: 18

Science Education

 * Percentage of schools teaching biological evolution: 98%
 * Percentage of schools teaching creation: 5%
 * Percentage of schools teaching round earth: ~100%
 * Percentage of schools teaching recent creation: 0.5%
 * Views on the origins of humanity:
 * Humans arose due to natural processes: 76%
 * Humans arose due to natural processes, with divine help: 12%
 * Humans were created no more than 10k years ago: 2%
 * Uncertain: 10%
 * Views on age of the earth:
 * Conventional age of 4.5 billion years: 88%
 * Under 10,000 years: 2%
 * Uncertain: 10%
 * View on shape of the earth:
 * Roughly spherical: 95%
 * Flat: 0.5%
 * Uncertain: 4.5%
 * View on the earth's interior:
 * Filled/Not Hollow: 96.5%
 * Hollow: 0.5%
 * Uncertain: 3%
 * View on chemtrails:
 * Real threat: 0.4%
 * Hoax: 92.6%
 * Uncertain: 7%
 * View on MSG:
 * Safe: 95%
 * Dangerous: 3.5%
 * Uncertain: 1.5%
 * View on climate change:
 * It's a real thing, and humans are/were part of the problem: 83%
 * It's a real thing, but humans are/were not a part of the problem: 9%
 * It doesn't exist: 1%
 * Uncertain: 7%
 * View on GMOs:
 * Safe: 88%
 * Dangerous and/or harmful: 1.5%
 * Uncertain: 10.5%
 * View on Greater Illinois and ARI:
 * Beneficial: 38%
 * Harmful: 34%
 * Not much effect: 24%
 * Uncertain: 4%

Meat Production Statistics (2039)
The following does not include accidents or animal testing. Montana is landlocked, so no fish.
 * # of chickens: 22.4B
 * # of pigs: 245M
 * # of cows: 146M
 * # of sheep/lambs: 95.3M
 * # of turkeys: 86.2M
 * # of ducks: 27.1M
 * # of geese: 12.5M
 * # of goats: 11.7M
 * # of horses: 2.67M
 * # of camels: 1.98M
 * # of rodents: 823k

Trivia

 * Montana was formed out of a political collapse caused by far-right groups, later to be stabilized.
 * Montana assimilated Wyoming during the American Collapse. The city of Helena was couped shortly after Cheyenne was couped.
 * Interstate 90 has the most traffic of any road in Montana.
 * Montana is actually at par with Greater Illinois in gene editing technology. Usually they either surpass GI, or GI surpasses them.
 * The Montanan sect of Seventh-day Adventism has accepted both recent creation and progressive creation as acceptable for adherents to hold to. The prevalence of progressive creationism in Montanan SDAs is possibly due to the fact that opposing young-Earth creationism is a strong social norm in Montana. This has posed a significant selective pressure to religious groups in the area, especially Adventists and traditionally pro-YEC religious groups. Bartonism is one of the few SDA sects in Montana that oppose progressive creation.
 * In the early 2030s, Montana had more people than living spaces.
 * Individuals who were originally Montanans/Wyomingites before the Collapse are relatively uncommon. Most people in Western Montana are either Russian or Californian immigrants while most people in Eastern Montana are Illinoisan or New Englander immigrants.
 * [META] as of now, "Crishoh Ashtoel" is equivalent to OceanClouds (or OCYT).