Custom Canterlot · 6:26am Nov 16th, 2023
Dreamed this up years ago, still like a lot of it. Loosely based off Edinburgh, which I might be able to move to in a couple of years if this deal I'm crossing my fingers over goes smoothly.
OLD TOWN
BATTLE MARKET: One of the main business streets and tourist hotspots. Originally just Market Street until a war spilled into the capital from further up the continent, repelled by all the little ponies putting aside their differences to hurl their wares (and often each other) at the factions until they cut it out and put together a treaty.
THE ROYAL LIBRARY: The first public library in Canterlot. Twilight had to get it from somewhere.
AREAWAY: The most up and downy part of Canterlot, city of a million staircases. A repurposed series of mine entrances turned into a neighbourhood. Most of the residential stuff is underground, which is why the various shops seem to be randomly stacked on top of each other. Not to be confused with the New Town club of the same name. Constantly is by tourists.
THE KNOT: A tangle of interconnecting streets: Baker, Grocer, and Maker. Both inspiration for the Equestrian nursery rhyme and home of the legendary detective Shamrock Runes and his trusted assistant Dr. Mason! Close to Highland Yard. You really do have to be a native to make your way around all three.
GRAND GILLY: A large park/plaza district that served as the official spot for royal entertainment centuries ago, jousting and circuses and so on. In the modern era it still makes most of its money renting as venues and accommodation for performers, and is the unofficial hub of the beloved Canterlot tradition/seasonal pain in the ass the Fringe Festival.
BARBICAN: A neighbourhood built out of and named after what was once the capital’s fortified main entrance. The actual barbican does alright for itself as a star gazing spot, its uppermost balconies covered in telescopes.
SCHOOL FOR GIFTED UNICORNS: Princess Celestia’s pride and joy, both as a school built out of an old guard fort and a place where special little ponies can learn about the side of themselves they’re tapping into. Built in the royal gardens stretching between Old and New Town, with large (and heavily guarded) parks for the foals to play in once the day is done.
HUB HALL: Off Faun Market. Old Town’s former city hall long since replaced by the New Town version, now mostly a rented meeting place for various Canterlot orgs, such as the Loyal Order of Water Buffalos of which Night Light is a member. It’s something to do Fridays now he’s retired.
DISCOVERY CANAL: The Sparkle family’s neighbourhood. A series of streets built around a long since dammed up stretch of canal, which was turned into a public garden/park rather than have a mud pit in the middle of the street. It’s a nice place to grow up.
ROUND HILL: Originally an independent mining town before joining the others to form the original capital, built out of and around a series of hills. Lots of up and down streets. They keep themselves in shape, those Canterlot ponies.
GARRISON STREET: Security was a big thing in the less civilised pony days, so Equestria’s first army fort was a big deal and built as such. So big in fact that as war became more sophisticated (insert Celestia scoffing here) it became defunct and was large enough to be turned into public housing. Famously a fun project between Princess Platinum and Commander Hurricane, and possibly the birthplace of the water pistol. It’s at least a matter of record they chased each other all over the place.
THE WHISPER DISTRICT: One of the first districts to turn its large underground assets into a functioning undercity neighbourhood. Named after the belief that if a pony stands perfectly still and listens you can hear the sounds of the under-town going on down there…
THE LEAD BALLOON CLUB: Historic Equestrian comedy club and Pinkie’s favourite stop. Lead as in the metal, not as in it is the leading balloon.
WHITE STEEPLE: One of the main tourist spots, mostly for the reputation of infamous masked prankster Spring Heels. Named after the distinctive white buildings carved out of the short hills that littered the region back in the day.
GREYMALKIN STREET: The slightly shadier side of Old Town due to the more gothic architecture.
ANTICOR: The latest club, built out of an old guard house from the capital’s Lots of Spiky Bits phase.
DIAMOND TIPS: One of Rarity’s favourite supply shops. Bit pricy but it’s Canterlot and who passes up a chance to commission diamond dog jewel genius Aggregate?
MOUSEHOLE STREET: A winding stretch of drained riverbed converted into a street. Named after its many, many doorways from when it was a quick way to get mining carts to the surface. Good place to ambush someone if you’re so inclined.
THE GANTRY: A series of large communal elevators built from a heavy-duty mining freight system, the biggest access to the under town. Celestia is constantly trying to find a way to develop a similar system in New Town to cut down on congestion.
NEW TOWN
AQUAFORTIS AVENUE: A large avenue a couple of blocks from the Magic Quarter, dealing in all sorts of magical supplies, domestic and specialised. Twilight shops here as much as anypony, sure, but she doesn’t know, it all feels so commercialised now, y’know? It’s getting so you have to sneak into the Cauldron to get the really good stuff. Um. Or so people tell her.
SHIELD STREET/WATCH HOUSE: The main Canterlot E.U.P. precinct, so big it’s practically its own neighbourhood. Some cheeky snot keeps leaving Buddy, Your Friendly Guard Pal dolls everywhere.
BANNER STREET: Canterlot’s main parade route. Used for the kart derby because the Sisters had it built to twist and turn dramatically. All that being towed and waving would be just so tedious otherwise.
PEARL HANDLE: One of the fashion districts and home of Rarity’s local boutique. And so the empire building begins.
INCITMENT STREET: Nice, quiet residential neighbourhood in the middle of bustling Canterlot. The one street in Canterlot where nothing happens. Someone had to have cast a spell on it, they just had to.
OXON STREET: A busy street a little before you get to the financial district. Named to commemorate the Oxon who helped defend and repair the city during an incursion by one of the Storm King’s predecessors.
RASION D’ETRE: Rarity’s favourite restaurant. Practically its own culinary city state, built out of an old panopticon that stretches deep into the undercity.
MOORING STREET: One of the suppliers to Equestrian adventurers, originally a warehouse district built for docking airships and storing their cargo. Decent apartment rents because to this day you never know when some grudge match is going to come crashing through your living room and sword fight on your table. The airship dock closest to the city is built into the hill overlooking it.
PLATINUM MEMORIAL GARDENS: Built a few streets away from the royal gardens and Celestia’s school for the gifted. A tribute to the families that first governed Equestria. Princess Celestia visits the monument to Queen Palladium, her wife and the one who made her a princess, quite often.
STATION STREET: Canterlot actually has several rail stations but the one in central New Town is the busiest, so. Hotels and malls mostly.
EVENIN’ SIDE: The district closest to the end of the city and so the one that is covered by darkness and the light of the moon the earliest. Nicely serene place. Rarity can try all she likes, but she’ll never be a true Canterlotian until she learns to stop pronouncing it with a g.
WALKWAY STREET: Technically several streets because it was the first part of the city to feature a large network of walkways between tower blocks. That’s Canterlot for you. Can’t go down anymore, build up. Rainbow Dash likes to weave between them. Celestia and Luna never chide her for this because they’d be hypocrites.
NOCTURN: A sloping, twisting street that curves through central Canterlot and winds up in the shadow of the many taller buildings. One of the nightlife spots.
GUILD STABLE: A former warehouse district long since rebuilt as the home of the various Canterlot guilds, each of them up to something, those rascals. Has a good view of the castle’s central spire. Which if you think about it means an enterprising pony with a telescope could also look down on what they’re up to. “What? Deliberately building a neighbourhood to keep my most likely enemies where I can see them, even going so far as to give it a cheeky name to that effect? Goodness me, I hope I never become as cynical as you, Twilight Sparkle!”
THE SCHOOL OF MAGIC: Celestia’s big pony school, located further uphill and stretching across to the University of Canterlot and the Royal Medical College.
PALACE SHADES: A residential neighbourhood built at the base of the mountain of Canterlot Castle. The affectionate name aside, it did once house the palace that was the Sisters’ residence in the capital when they lived in the one in Ponyville (Luna wanted easier views of the stars and Celestia didn’t want to hang around after the loss of Palladium), which has now been converted into Parliament. The population is a mix between castle staff families and students from the magic school. In fact, it’s Twilight and Spike’s old neighbourhood from when Celestia arranged for them to live/work in the old library tower! Also home of the Pony Joe family franchise. Coffees shops and laundrettes abound. Also also secretly home to the Stretch, an apparently boring stretch (wink) of maintenance buildings and warehouses that in fact conceals one of the many river entrances into the Niche, Canterlot Castle’s legendary secret dock.
THE UNDERCITY
10th AND HOLLOW: Hollow is its own undercity neighbourhood but it technically shares infostructure and resources with Old Town’s 10th Street, so. Makes things easier for maps and the underground transit line.
SECRET STATION: Not really, but that’s a little Canterlot humour for you there. The hub of underground rail transit. Nice chandeliers.
PRIME CHAMBERS: The network of tunnels and caves that channel the River Prime, Canterlot’s last river which mostly flows underground. A romantic getaway for ponies looking to take a candle lit cruise and those weirdos who’re really into rocks and mold.
ARCOVE STREET: The undercity facilities/dormitories of the School of Magic. ‘Nother little pun name. Large stalactites hollowed out into research buildings and designed to look like upside down versions of the ones up top.
STAIRCASE BURROW: A shaft full of interconnecting walkways later converted into staircases that’d make Esher salivate. The caves in the sides have been turned into housing and workshops. Aggregate works there.
JOURNEY STREET: Well-lit shopping district. Since street art is frowned upon by THE MAN up top (“I beg your pardon?” – Princess Celestia, 1961) the walls and ceilings are covered in works of urban art, further adding colour.
THE VAULTS: A business district that specialises in security, named after Canterlot’s legendary vaults.
WISDOM STREET: The former residence/workshop of Starswirl the bearded, turned into undercity property when the sheer amount of notes he had in there caused the old place to collapse into the cavern under it. He’s flattered by the name!
FORGETOWN: Shares its name with the upper city district above it, both built for the iron works of Canterlot before the actual work was moved into the under facilities and the upper district was remade into housing for the many families that had worked the trade.
SPIRAL ROW: A large spiral staircase carved out of an enormous stalactite by an, um, eccentric occult genius from the city’s old days. The walls around it have been converted into shopping and residential space, but the residents can be a bit…odd. Or maybe it’s just the only place in the Capital the odd feel at home. Where detectives go when looking for intel, so jazz clubs abound.
DEPOT DALE: A disused mine repurposed to act as the city’s major underground storage space.
THE FOOTSTOOL: Nicknamed for the four large columns that prop it up. Junction for the underground and full of the more affordable under hotels so you can have that genuine undercity experience of your teeth rattling in your mouth every day.
HAVEN PARK: Canterlot has several above ground parks but no real main one, and none of them can hold a candle to this undercity wonder. Not only is it a magically thriving patch of vegetation in the undercity caverns stretching under the royal gardens but it’s full of magical underground fauna that bathes the area in aurora borealisial glory. Prime romantic spot.
THE SEWERS: Everywhere has them. The amount of magic in Canterlot has led to rumours of…things that live down there.
THE CAULDRON
A little bit of Ahnk Morpork that got glued into Equestria by mistake. Formerly Park Basin, now the obligatory bad side of town. A former shopping district on the edge of the city, which was the problem: it was nothing but shops. Since most of the districts are self-sufficient and there was no mining infrastructure for undercity development Park Basin eventually wilted, leaving a nice little burrow for the worst of the capital to slough into. Guards only go there to drag disreputable members back to the barracks and often as not to face charges. Back alley business deals and illegal spell ingredients happen nightly. If it’s the sort of behaviour that’d make you spit your tea in shock, it happens in the Cauldron, so named because something’s always brewing. It makes Celestia so mad. Her last act before retiring is to open an undercity train tunnel in it, so now you lot have no excuse not to mingle with proper society. Do or don’t, see if I care. Features include:
BASIN PARK: The former neighbourhood namesake, and it’s one point of pride. Still well maintained by the city gardeners (quickly and only in the daylight) and a meeting place for the various factions. It’s also the one neutral spot, since if anypony so much as throws a pie in there then they take away everypony else’s excuse not to, and that could escalate quickly. Celestia’s own contribution to this policy is the promise that if she hears about anything fatal in there, she will finally demolish the whole place and leave you rats to scurry somewhere else.
UNCLE CURIOS’: Only the best in What is That Even Doing Here or Why Would You Have That magical artefacts!
SNAKE EYES: Notorious casino, once the airship cargo depot that supplied the shops. Now it supplies other stuff, none of it something you’d show little ponies. Affectionately named after crooked owners and real estate developers Grass Snake and Side Eyes.
THISTLE STREET: Aquafortis Avenue’s sinister twin, a twisting row of deserted restaurants and garden suppliers turned into Got the Licence Here Somewhere Officer, Honest apothecaries. Closest the Cauldron has to a residential district because the upper rooms can be rented out to disreputable patrons who need a place to lay low.
THE BEATEN HOOF: The obligatory dive bar. The Crazy Horse, Happy Harry’s, Jack Rabbit Slim’s, the Mended Drum, you get the idea. If you’re looking for a pony who knows a pony what nopony can find, etc. The sign is a neon enchanted depiction of lightning bolts growing out of a bandaged hoof, which nopony remembers how to switch off. Legend has it Celestia could see it from her south tower bedroom at night, which is why she moved into the north one in such a hurry. Another legend is that the series of hooded Amazonian adventures who show up to brawl are her in disguise, letting off some steam. Only in the Cauldron…
The obvious comparison is Fred Flintstone. But remember, the family's oldest child is a stallion, one who's only slightly less freakishly strong than his little sister. I'm not saying Shining was originally raised by mammoths, but this does comfortably put Night Light in the Barney Rubble slot.
Wouldn't that also make it the first to get the light of dawn? I suppose not as many ponies are awake at that point.
There's a card game joke in here somewhere. Though I assume none of them are run by a mad scientist who also happens to be a dragon.
See, that just has me thinking about Peter Trotter, royal consort to the Princess. I can only imagine how both he and Twilight will react when the abdication plans come to light.
The Crown was unavailable comment. Nor was the princess wearing it.
Wonderful overview of your Canterlot. Up there with some of the best city descriptions I've seen in RPG supplements in terms of story hooks and little details to make the place really feel alive.
5755122
Luna based play on the actual Edinburgh Morningside area.
I mean, I'm positing that there's so many caverns under the capital that there's an entire secondary city underneath it, dragons like caves for hoarding, there's precedent. Since this is already lifting from Pratchett maybe he could be the local equivalent of Chrysoprase.
"Please honey, they can only get worse, renovation is so expensive, why waste the money, think what the treasury'll say, please-please-please-please-please--"
"Please! You only want a whole neighbourhood you can beat up when you're down here and bored!"
There's definite plans in a season eight and nine direction, here's a possible future to that effect.
Thank you! That's very flattering.