Staten Island

There's something about the fringes of Staten Island that will always inspire sentiments of unease. After the bomb, much of Staten Island has fallen into glorious disrepair, so much so that places that were already in stages of decay look more like monuments to entropy than once urban settlements in decline. While much of the island was suburban residential areas before the bomb, there were two crowning moments that drove this borough of New York into an early grave. The first was the mass exodus of survivors and panicked people fleeing Manhattan. They came by foot, bicycle and car across the bridges to Staten Island, all manner of desperate and frightened people flooding into a crowded place. While some fled through to New Jersey, others simply couldn't — or wouldn't — go further. This, like in Queens, led to an eventual chaos that would in time eclipse the pandemonium in the eastern edge of New York after the bomb.

Staten Island was in the direct path of the fallout from the explosion, and after thousands fled to the island, the entire populace was forcibly evacuated. Those few that managed to stay, clung to their homes desperately, and those few who did would suffer from radiation sickness and the ever-escalating crime rate. By the time Staten Island got the "all clear" from the government, the damage had already been done.

What was one suburban neighborhoods and parklands is now a monument to decay. Houses lie in various states of disuse and ruin, and like much of New York has seen property values nosedive. Few want to move out to a formerly irradiated zone, and even fewer want to return to a place so rife to violent crime. Now, much of Staten Island lies in various states of decay. Houses abandoned by families that fled the city, were forced into foreclosure and were never resold, or simply places where entire families went missing and are now squatted in by any number of transients line the once peaceful streets. Staten Island is a home to crumbling infrastructure, spotty electricity, and people who wish to remain undiscovered by law enforcement.

Only the island's southeastern region shows any obvious sign of recovery from this desolation. The government-sanctioned "Reclaimed Zone" has become a seat of revitalization on the island, patrolled by private security and National Guard in an attempt to restore law and order to the island.

Places

• Fresh Kills Harbor
  • The Angry Pelican
• Northern Staten Island
  • Port Ivory
    • Howland Hook Facility
    • Little Green House
  • Primatech Paper Facility
  • Staten Island Boat Graveyard
  • The Rookery
    • Anarchy Customs
    • Sheung Wan Kitchen
    • Shooters Bar And Bistro
    • St.Joseph's Church
    • The Happy Dagger
    • Tucker's Pawn Shop
• Southern Staten Island, "Outer District"
  • Old Dispensary
  • Outerbridge Crossing
  • Reclaimed Zone
    • Eltingville Blocks
      • Harbor Court
      • Oakdale Community Center
      • Saint Clare's
    • Miller Airfield
      • Hangar 3
    • Staten Island Hospital
    • The Lighthouse
    • The Sweat Lodge
  • Swinburne Island
• Staten Island Greenbelt
  • Farm Colony
• The Garden
• Verrazano-Narrows Bridge

Trivia

• Following the destruction of the destruction of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge at the end of January, 2009, there is no appreciable military or police presence on the island. The only land routes left after the destruction of the Verrazano-Narrows to access Staten Island are through New Jersey (two highway bridges that have been closed, and one unused rail bridge). The Staten Island Ferry is no longer in operation, meaning access to the island will be through walking, or private boats. The Coast Guard is not yet stopping people coming and going from the island.