Derp Transportation in Columbia

* See also Infinite BS (hub of all that wrongness)
* See also Zeppelin_on_the_Brain
* See also Skyhook and Skyline
* See also Transportation_Systems (Sci-Fi Rapture Engineering)
* See also Derpistan
* See also Floatyshit(tm) (which more than a little transport depends on)
* See also Funky_Columbia_Machinery
 "A More Feeble Transport System in Columbia Can Hardly Be Imagined" - Robert Moses :
Columbia Freight (almost needs a whole page dedicated to the derpiness that's obvious to anyone with eyes)
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 "DON'T EVER LET AN ARTIST DESIGN SOMETHING YOUR LIFE DEPENDS ON" - Neil Armstrong 
So awful. Most Technology shown in those Bugs Bunny Cartoons is more realistic than many of the things shown in the Infinite BS game.
The Concept Artists came up with some fairly plausible systems. Of Course, so many of THOSE were NOT to be used in the released game.
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No Autos Nor Trucks ? :
Pointless with the Disconnected non-interconnection of the chunks of Columbia (Shit City Design). A plausible system coulda been there, but then it would be hard to justify the Player's game-blocked movement ( and thats when Columbia was 'normal', and not wreckage/ruins like Rapture ). 
Automobiles were the 'happening' transportation at the time of the game (and accelerated hugely and being HARD TO MISS for anyone 'Looking into the Future'). Across the REAL America it was quite a fundamental element.
BUT : any wheeled vehicle is hugely inhibited by this lousy city layout (including for bicycles, pushcarts). Horses pulling wagons (as seen in-game) would be highly problematic/ineffective ( Hence : 'Derp' at 120 Db )
1910 ... Real ... ( Compare this to that Steampunk-Reject Horse-thing the developers came up with ... )
With Fink and Comstock allegedly able to LOOK into the FUTURE, they picked rather mentally-defective seeming choices for Columbia's various vehicles/conveyances.
FAILCAT in his FAILCOPTER had bumper-crops of *FAILZ* to deliver to Columbia ( and to Kenny & Co - 18 trips actually ).
Imagine this thing coming at you in Columbia !!! Gunports all round with guys shooting at you.
Put it on legs and have it solve the problem of all those bothersome Stairs, and have it able to climb onto 'Barges' to get across the city - OR better : Have its own Skyline mechanisms (hooks) ontop to make use of that transport route where available.
See ... Real Imagination.
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"Penny Farthing" Bicycle - how quaint and old-fashioned. The modern "safety bicycle" started around 1880.
Columbia is full of stairs, and with few actual roads, and has rather low railings/ballustrades. That is a perfect formula for DEATH BY FALLING OFF. Simply another example of : the gamemakers not thinking things through OR getting stuck on 'Game-isms' which ruined any attempt to show a proper relevant setting.
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Columbia - A Flying Lump - Somehow : 
How does ALL that weight hang in the Sky ? ( They do for some reason have backwards HEAVY Cobblestone roads to lift The first uses of this road asphalt were in Battery Park and on Fifth Avenue in New York City in 1872 and on Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington D.C., in 1877.. ) ALL supposedly Done with these "Quantum Particle" point things ? In the BaSx plot Elizabeth has to bring one back from Columbia to supposedly lift a whole building with one. 
The engineering of this whole 'Floatyshit(tm) mechanism is as badly fictional and unexplained as most of the rest of the Infinite BS story. (( IT IS MORE like some GINGIN - Cheap Booze - apparently Booker wasn't the only substance abuser we have involved with this game. Booze or drugs amongst the gamemakers were perhaps endemically imbibed to come up with such feeb stuff as compose this game ... )) 
SO, all the buildings massive weight has to be hung (supported) from those quantum "points" --- so requiring some massive structures to then distribute the involved massive weight's forces - Or we just wave such reality away ( Cuz "Story", you know ... )
Columbia is thus like one big bridge, or maybe a 'hanging mobile' ( Except it is all hanging off invisible magic derp strings ).
With this being "the given story", everything else which is Wrong is mere *Bonus* Bad Fiction.
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Columbia Itself Is A 'Vehicle' .... SOOOOO :
I can just see the meeting : 'Columbia - Lets make it fly with rocket things !!!' ( Or a single Glowing Blue Orb ). WE SAW rocket engine(?) things in use on Columbia ( And also some big propeller things which might 'come in handy' for moving Columbia thousands of miles around the World. )
(( BTW - THIS ^^^ is really a 1920s cement truck ))
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Infinite BS Floaty Things :
The "Hand of the Profit/Prophet" ( Comstock's Death Barge ) might as well have been a Mississippi Steamboat styled craft for all the Zeppelin shape had to do with anything. Particle Floaties can be any shape desired. BUT BUT BUT "People trusted that Zeppelin-ish shape as something that flies" ??? How would they know, when most real dirigible advancements happened well after Columbia 'Seceded ??? AND then WHY isn't all of Columbia transport shaped like that IF such 'trust' is required ??? Notice those "Barges" are NOT Zeppelin Shaped ...
((( There's a pix somewhere like that )))
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The 'Skylines' would have been better off as Power Lines. You could still have the weird face-slicer Skyhook thingee to 'race along the wires' ( slide downslope on some of them at least ? ), except NOW they could go everywhere with lots of path changes and such. ( You look at a real picture from that time of a real city and there are tons of telephone wires going everywhere ). Booker could have walked on the wires since he's become a circus acrobat anyway. One of the 'Gearz' coulda been special shoes to allow him to Run on them. 
(( But again, this kinda game already with its freakish Rollercoaster railroads, which don't go anywhere, has to contrive to keep you from getting anywhere - except for the limited path they planned for you -- Imagine Columbia done Right using the MMORPG game engine )).
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Columbia's Various Archaic Wheeled Vehicles :
Columbia has almost no roads to connect the city sections, so most Carts/Wagons seen are virtually useless ( stuck in their little, really quite tiny, isolated city sections ). Bulk delivery vehicles moving on (carried by) the Skyway would have made sense, with delivery then within each floaty city section by the then-rolling vehicle ( though all the multi-leveling/stairs still interfere -- It is also still inefficient for a specialize/company wagon having to be kept available in EACH section or to wait for a moving 'Chunk' on multi hour cycles ). A 'Road' system needs to be extensive and contiguous to actually work ( DUH !!!! DUH !!!! == DERRRP ... The game designers didn't care to do logical details). It cannot be just 'For Show', as in THIS case it is, or should be, fundamental to the cities operation. General passenger transport in 'cars' on the Skyway would be useful, WITHOUT dangerous 'hanging by the arm', wrenching their limb out of its sockets/joints. That likewise could/should have been shown used in Columbia ( Concept/early 'Trailer' props/assets showed something like that ), instead of the Release Game's illogic of citizens again supposedly impractically traversing a disjoint set of barges/gondolas/walkways, one after another.
It is similar in Rapture, though the Tram system ( I've extensively expanded use of ) at least could have been there - even when largely unseen in-game. Stuff has to get around a city, and the Bathyspheres we've seen just don't work efficiently ( or at all for certain uses ) for the needs of a large population. The remainder Atlantic Express shown in BS2 ( allegedly shut down in much of the city in BS1 times ) did not seem a flexible/cross-connected enough system, and with too much long walking required, particularly for anyone carrying/delivering something.
Cities live by their transport, and the ad hoc flexibility of Roads and Streets cannot really be there in either the Rapture or Columbia we were shown.
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This is an actually 'thought out' organized interconnected Transit SystemFrom Red Dead Redemption 2 in the City of Saint Denis - a Trolley system.
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A Problem with the Transportation in Columbia - It is Inefficient Getting ANYWHERE :
You have to take one thing to first get to X, then walk to get to another going to Y, and then again on a ways to something else to get to Z, and maybe one of those floating building sections ontop of the rest. Hardly a bother ? It is a nice stroll ? How about for the people who have to get to/from work every day via the same ineffective system ? They can't just Teleport via Tears you know ( Actually ... Why Not ?? ).
It MIGHT have been semi-intelligent to have passenger trains on the Skyline -- Likely what it was originally to be for ( or SHOULD have been for ) when Columbia was a Exposition Showcase City. (( Heck, they even had a Moving Walkway at the *REAL* 1893 Exposition. Google "moving walkway 1893 exposition". )) Unfortunately, that whole stupid Skyway Rollercoaster mess was illogical as created, Freight or not. BUT it (applying some creative reality) could have been straightened out to be like the elevated trains that were being put in the big cities at that time, to be something REALLY impressive AND logical. (( IF it had NOT merely been turned into a ham-strungHamstringing is used primarily to incapacitate a human or animal and render them incapable of effective movement. Also used when referring to abuse and incompetent mishandling of something. game mechanism for shooting things from. ))
That way you would NOT have a disconnected higgledy-piggledy mish-mosh of half-arsed conveyances, but a systematic CONVENIENT system running logical routes, with meaningful transfer stations ( looking a bit like the Trailer's/pix-still's Skyline Stations, that were subsequently thrown away/unused/irrelevant/leftover/cut ).
Unfortunately, with an efficient transit system, it was harder to think of ways to FORCE the Player through the games storypath maze ( There was NO easy alibis like 'civil war' destruction -or- tyrant-ordered lockdowns in bright and shiny Columbia ... ). Having to get into the cars to travel might've been a chance to get some meaningful conversation between Elizabeth and Booker ( another thing bang-bang game writers wish to avoid ... ) (( YEP YEP YEP, WE DOOS A few canned/scripted situations - That's the ticket. "You pays yur money, and yur taken for a ride ..." --- Hence it being : DERRRRRP !!!! ))
RAPTURE HAD SIMILAR PROBLEMS ( but not as Fustercluck bad ) 
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A SteamPunky Vision Of City Transportation - Track Actually Supported ...
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SOME AUTOMOBILES, STUPID !!!! 
I know WHY they didn't try to have Automobiles in Columbia -- It was TOO HARD GAMEMAKING-WISE. It Gave too much Control to the Player. AND driving an Automobile just 150 feet and then having to stop being forced by the puny game level size limitations would be ALMOST as stupid as those Skyline Circle paths you saw in the game's 'battle arena' areas. 
Automobiles (and Trucks) WERE the most practical/cost-effective/versatile transport of Columbia's 1912 Era (and even moreso to have been seen 'In The Future' Another Logic GAFF like the game makers locking onto those bleedin Dirigibles). Automobiles just as easily could be powered by Blue Orby things too, AND FLY !!!!!!. They would have been what Fink "saw in The Future", and roads would (COULD) have been a 'proper' transportation system within Columbia. The Infinite gamemakers somehow Got stuck in Bad Steampunk mode, and couldn't even hint at Automobiles for Columbia.
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Hmmm, Awnings ... NOTE- Sign painted simply on the flat side of a building.
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The Rollercoaster-like Skylines shown in the Infinite BS game were shown to be pretty much the opposite of what a realistic system of that type SHOULD have been. SO assuming the 'Do it Cuz it Looks Cool' mentality of the game designers, THIS is what any roads in Columbia would have looked like.
EXCEPT : DO Eliminate those supporting trestle-works -- As the game's dingbat Skylines generally lacked that Real World required structural feature too.
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Columbia's Skyline - Designed By People On LSD ( Ergot Poisoning of the Bagels Maybe ? ) :
* No reason for those tight curves ( Columbia is a big place - You don't need tight curves ). (( Perfect for exaggerating of exciting sorta-flying 'Swingy' 'Skyline' Player movement, though ... )) 
* No reason for steep rollercoaster dips ( great for crushing/shaking-up Cargo/Passengers, or for exciting graphical game movement ). (( Again for an effect in a game - Not freight or passenger safety/comfort ))
* No support for the Tracks ( Oh, that Quantumz stuff ... But I though that's a Particle 'Fixed in Space' thing, which really is pretty nonsense when Columbia happens to constantly 'move' and cruise about the World ). "That's Witchcraft !!!! - I ain't goin anywhere near that Satan Spawned thing !!!! TO HELL WITH THE FALSE FOUNDER COMSTOCK !!!!!!! BURN IT, BURN IT ALL DOWN !!!!!"
* No Passenger traffic use ?? - When it IS the obvious way to get around ALL of Columbia without 5 other transportation methods being required, and a terribly/inefficient disjoint system. Seriously, doing it RIGHT would have been something for the original 'Show City' Exposition operation. (( Bad/sloppy design to shape a game, THAT is so easy to spot. ))
* No visible way to drive the things on that track ( so it is Quantumz Magic again ? ). Sorry, NO. That verkakte rotating blade-hook thing cannot rotate like that to pull you along -- It is mechanically impossible.)
* Skylines Usually shown running within a small loop within a game level ( Thus being pointless as transportation - It is its alleged reason for existing. )
* Created simply as a game mechanic, and THEN downsized to be a shadow of what was originally shown (in Game Trailers) because the 'big game' possibilities it showed really could NOT be delivered. (( If they EVER intended the game to be what was seen as in the Trailer Videos - Otherwise It was great fraudulent promotional stuff. )) 
* Stupid Skyhook device ( Something supposedly made into a commercial product in Columbia yet !! ). No Sane person would want to ride the Skyline like that. (( Kenny, If you wanted a chainsaw weapon, then have a Chainsaw. )) 
(( Hey, Did the gamemakers first think : "WE NEED A WAY TO CUT SOMEONES HEAD CLEAN OFF" ??? ... Yeah, 'Story' ... ))
* One 'Skyline' runs around like a Rollercoaster WITHIN the Hand of the Prophet -- Contriv-itus Zeppelin on the Brain. (( Oh Yes, didn't you know, all Zeppelins had a Rollercoaster -- It was first started by the Germans ... ))
* The whole 'jumping onto' (and off) the Skyline thing is the perfect activity for pulling one's Limb Joints out of their sockets ( or plunging you to your death when you miss ). (( All those imbecile writers should be forced 'at gunpoint' to hang by one arm from a simple pullup bar for only a minute or two to teach them how stupid their idea is )).
* Used in place of having some neat Flying personal mechanisms for the Player ( a logical Quantumz technological advancement ). BUT it woulda messed up the designer's still-mostly 2D design of the game (( Sorry, in Infinite BS you did NO big game advancement Kenny. )). Having something on tracks lets them control the Players access to the scene ( important when the levels/game-progression has to be generically small and linear ). 
* Use as an added combat obstacle/block prop, tactical Activation of moving boxcars, etc, was negligible. 
* WORST OF ALL : THIS Was forced into our (RETCON-d BaSx DLC) Rapture in an even more asinine ( lazily-cloned garbage/non-sensical ) way.
* Coulda had a 'Heavy Hitter' opponent ( A "Security Train", or the like, to run on these rails ), but sorry, the writers never thought of it ( or the programmers capable of it ). Likewise a dearth of interesting 'Tear' interactions. 
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Skyline Boxcars ?? :
Raw materials for the city have to come from somewhere to put into those boxcars ( or to be made into the things put into them ). (( Or they could just be full of BS constantly circulating about the Fantasy City ?? ))
What population even needs such a system when the visible city appears to only house mere hundreds of citizens ( Half seem to be Police/Para-military, and another half the Anarchists ), and the 'Servitor Class' ( where THEY all live is a mystery -- Though the lower orders might mostly habituate under the streets ). Those few vending carts and wagons would be sufficient for everything ( Assuming the stuff has to be produced from somewhere - instead of just magically appearing ).
Similarly, moving people in a proper citywide system would have been logical. But no 'People Movers' equivalent seem to be anywhere seen on these Skyline 'rails' ( despite stations being labeled ). The game writers show their ignorance of understanding of what viable city/town transportation was like ( and had to be ) before automobiles/trucks became common.
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==Finkton's Weird Little Surface Railroad==
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Apparently They Had (Sortof) Conventional Railroad Tracks In Columbia
Ground Railroads in factory areas ( But don't connect with other parts of Columbia - leaving little reason for such to exist ).
You see this kind of thing in multiple places in the game. No sign of wheels under the Skyline cars to facilitate their ground transport mode ( very useful for actual use ) on local tracks like these. The 'horse' thing might be SteamPunky, but really is a horrendous stupidity with all the other more advanced ( and thought out ) things seen in Columbia.
Disjoint Transportation - Almost as if it was Designed to be Inefficient. Don't ever let 'artists' design anything you want to actually work or to which you will trust your life. THAT GOES DOUBLE FOR GAME ARTISTS. 
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Tank Cars in Fink Mfg Transport Yard ... :
A bit odd "GRWX" is a fake AAR (started 1934) railroad-like standard company designation ( wholly unneeded in Columbia ... )
F.I.N.K. would have made more sense, and that tank car's mechanism (trucks particularly) is not American standard (looks more European style). In any case, where does the raw materials for whatever is in that tank come from ( Wherever that is, it is hardly likely to come contained this way ). Why need oil when you have 'Quantumz Power' or whatever - When Even the 'horse' already seems powered that way. NOTE - That rail siding upslope is too steep, unlikely for the 2 horsie cart wheels to have traction enough. ( OMG, He's complaining about Physics AGAIN !!! Yes, Yes I am. )
But then ... Flying City ... Time Travel ... God-like Interdimensional Abilities ... Invading Hello Kitties in Power Armor ... Quantum This and That, Anti-Gravity, etc ... What's a little minor unreality for a Shoot-em-up blast-fest] game, hyped with faked 'supposed' American Exceptionalism and so much illogical Religion and other Faux-Whatever ????
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Fink whines about Costs of Labor, yet he has workers wiping down Skyline Boxcars ? 
NOBODY does that in the Real World ( For Passenger cars they do, but NOT Freight cars ).
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== "Barges" ==
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'Barges' ? Hover vs Fly vs Float. "Hover craft" not invented until 1956 so the 'hover' doesn't have the later connotation of that vehicle type. Balancing is a tricky technical system EVEN in our advanced Tech World. Real Hovercraft use the ground immediately under them to offer the stabilizing influence to the mechanism. Those odd wooden(?) rockets on either side of those 'Barges' - NOTE they are NOT Pointing to the REAR to impel/drive the Craft forward, which it would have IF the 'FloatyShit' was simply making it float/self-balancing. One rocket fails, putting it all out of balance, and it FLIPS OVER and quick death ensues. (( It is like something a game designer who flunked Tinkertoys in Kindergarten would come up with - Ohh, its got rocket jets - DERRRRRRP !!!! ))
Those HAZARDOUS rocket things propelling 'Barges' in Infinite BS - German engineers 30 years later (WW2) with 500 Times the Skill/knowhow/Brains/Genius and available technology/materials/tools ... STILL had endless trouble making such things work ... IT Took years and the 'V2' almost missed WW2. Steam-powered propellers not good enough for them ? BTW : you 'writers', WHERE does the rocket fuel come from ?? More Quantumz magic ? You DO know such things use HUGE amounts of Fuel ? NO ? It IS called "ROCKET SCIENCE", because it IS something KNOWN (Real World) 'to be difficult' ( and still is today ). And (BTW) Flames big enough to 'drive' things through the air tend to set things on Fire and incinerate passerbys ( Maybe useful to menace the 'cattle' in Shantytown - A Menace Accessory ... SEE Heavy Hitters ).
(( Done for the lighting/animation effect ? Isn't that the whole game in a nutshell ? ))
WE Could have had neat/spiffy Sail Driven floating 'Barges' - except those would take skill to have them maneuvering about the games terrain, AND the sail would obstruct/get-in-the-way of using them as Player 'Jump' targets and for the clumsy combat activities the game allows. 
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The Barges STILL are far more versatile than the other derpy transport methods. Barge Docks could have been everywhere to allow more convenient point-to-point access to ANYWHERE else in Columbia.
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Barges With Chain Gang Convicts Breaking Rocks ... ( 'The Derp' never ends in Infinite BS )
BTW - sledgehammers on a wooden deck - That gets an extra DERP STAR awarded ...
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Cranes ( Why have Cranes when you can have floating Forklifts ?????? )
Even better - BARGES WITH CRANES ...
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==Skyline==
Things Having to Be Plausible (Skyline Again) :
Things have to be Plausible ? - Nope not in Infinite BS. But this proposal is about something better. Cable or Chain is NOW a Pointless Speculation ??? Trying to make sense when the game makers 'DID NOT CARE' about anything making sense ( and we can do better ). 
The problem with any real Cable or Chain driven system is the friction - with a real mechanism's complexity of rollers and guides required to reduce/prevent wear all along the LOOONG paths these things traverse. Consider ALL the resulting maintenance of machinery like that ( and this isn't a Cable Car on a street, Columbia's are WAY up in the air ... ). 
Another problem is : The need for a simple/robust 'grip' mechanism. A manual mechanism on a REAL street 'Cable Car' is needed to maintain control -- Dealing with vehicle/pedestrian traffic, as well as starting and stopping. This all requires a human operator. An overhead system at least can have a bit less track complication ( at 'stops' and the 'route ends' ), though a 'double railed track for it is a nightmare design.
Since paths between separated sections of Columbia are in the air -- a better city design having NO separate floaty bits (blocks of buildings ) would have allowed it ALL to have placed one continuous Road surface system and perhaps some few solid bridges. Of course, a city in separate floaty bits 'looked neat' for the game, but was a poor problematic ( potentially catastrophic failure-bound ) design, unfit for anything marginally realistic.
In the game, the Skyline became a downgraded/degenerated game feature ( the impressive action shown prominently in the earlier Trailers couldn't completely go away - They had to pretend it was still there ), but now it was reduced into so many rather pathetic circular battle arena elements. 
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==Gondolas==
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JustGlueOnGears.jpg|This is one seriously Derpy Mechanism
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TooDerpy.jpg|WTF Does This Mechanism DO ??? Those Cable-like things on Rollers(?) Are Used Like Rails
The 'Gondolas' seem to be used in fixed paths on Cables ( between Separately Floating Chunks of the City ) -- Via a design that is enough to make any engineer cringe and shake their head at the ignorance of the designer See "Fan Fiction Ignorance" - "It is Bad Fantasy" .. (( Hang them from above idiots!!! - But NO, that would 'get in the way' of the 'Death from Above' Leaping Attacks ... )) If it was self-floating then it need only be guided to its destination, not over-difficult to simply treat/use those Cables that way INSTEAD of employing them as if they were Rails the thing is sitting on. 
DOUBLE DOUBLE DERRRRRRRP !!!! 
I'm always amused by such mechanisms that belong in A Dimmer Brained Candy Land. (( Truly amusing is how this thing is supposed to stay the hell on the 2 cable/rail/whatevers ... These Gamemakers were Truly Clueless )). With that 45 degree downslope, the ride in these things must've been real fun. OH, See, With those rollers at that angle, they will impact the big cable(?) pulley thing and derail and send that vehicle into a plummeting screaming fall to its destruction on the ground ( No floaty quantum thingee ??? Why need to sit ON a cable ??? ). 
 Lesson : "DO NOT LET ANY "ARTIST" BUILD *ANYTHING* YOU USE IN YOUR REAL LIFE -- MOST OF THEM ARE TECHNICAL MORONS AND WILL GET YOU KILLED !!!!" 
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Q : "Oh, all you do is complain. What would YOU do different ?"
A : Not have this ridiculous Gondola thing for a start. ( to quote 70s Red Foreman : "They Promised Us Jetpacks !!!!" )
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==Gianourmous Bridges==
SO MUCH WRONG - Game makers I mean Too Much LDS In The 1960s ... a startrek reference ... Bridges to nowhere, impossibly huge Statues, a strange nature of Clouds, clusters of Floaty City Chunks just begging to run into each other, and buildings they didn't even read that "1900 Buildings for Dummies" Book for ...
"DO NOT EVER LET AN ARTIST CREATE SOMETHING YOUR LIFE DEPENDS ON" - I.M. Pei
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Smaller Bridges
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==STAIRS EVERYWHERE==
Since it Floated so magically, it coulda all been Flat. Only IDIOTS want stairs. This 'City' Coulda ALSO been formed in one big block, or a Flying Hill/Mountain In The Sky -- If you have to have somewhere high for some 'the lesser folk' to be 'looked down' upon by 'their Betters'. A nice gradual hill with winding roads and some elevators/funicularshttps://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=funicular+railway&qpvt=funicular+railway when you need shortcuts. Separate Columbia Chunks floating in the distance was a Game Contrivance - not any good plausible World-building.
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Automatic - Stallion and Horsecarts/Wagons
This is Extreme Level Prime DERP. I might imagine the meeting where this goofy thing was OK'd. Utterly idiotic in a air separated and stair impeded 'city'. 
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==Horse Carts==
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Facing the same problem as the Mechanical Horses/Wagons - Too many Stairs, and the disjoint nature of Columbia ( no contiguous street system ).
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==Zeppelins==
The ICONIC Stupidity ... Zeppelin On The Brain 
Problematic 'Zeppelin' Transportation :
Floatythings get blown all-over-the-place. Even a slight breeze is a problem. That is foremost when such vehicles 'land' (and takeoff). There are difficult even just trying to tie them down. 
ALL REAL dirigible airfields have that tall mooring mast, and require an 360-degrees-around open space -- for changing wind directions, and the airship shifting with it. There is also a LARGE ground crew required to grab/tie ropes and work winches and such. 
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Zeppelin Engine :
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MONGO OF THE ZEPPELINS ( Hand of the Profit )
They got too stuck on the Zeppelin shaping -- Real imagination would have it be some Giant Angel shape, which the Quantumz BS allowed. This isn't really aerodynamically efficient ( compare to a real Zeppelin/Airship ) so that need no longer be held to. Wouldn't a Giant Angel have been much more appropriate to the religious connotations of Comstock's 'The New Eden' theme ?
I'm sure that Lightning could have been made to 'shoot out of its eyes' and 'fireballs out of its ass', with the Quantumz Juju the game is based upon. Come to think of it, IT ( A Giant Angel "Hand of the Prophet" ) could have been a HUMONGUS Robot mechanism and had a pre-canned scene of it Rampaging through New York City - - - "Now That's Good Game Writin !!" ...
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AND OUTSIDE COLUMBIA ??? :
I DO Rip These 'Game Artists' a NEW ONE elsewhere in this WIKI about THIS Dimbulb thing. Idiots really did NOT get the 'Use the Future' concept/idea, and got stuck on cliche BAD Steampunk garbage ( Seriously, this is Bad 'Fan Fiction' illustration stuff ).
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==Lighthouse Rocket==
Seriously a sad copying of the BioShock Iconic structure. I Figure they needed it for that 'constants' thing -- Did they have that first, or think of that quantum-wrong phrase Man, Lighthouse, City stuff after the Lighthouse Idea ????
A magic rocket for a magic entry/city-reveal scene ... Really more something someone sees in a drug-addled dream.
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Lighthouse Map of Route :
Railroads crisscross that route path, and that thing called 'Telegraph' could be used to track movements. The US Government would then have no problem using artillery to shoot Columbia down -- Which probably happened in many/most of those 'parallel dimensions', resulting in most sideways 'Tears' leading to twisted wreckage of Columbia on the ground, and mangled remains of the "Comstock Cultists" ( 'well picked over' by scavengers and sightseers and souvenir hunters ).
That Infinite BS Lighthouse is not exactly a hidden base. And with weird things happening there, it would become known and an avenue for agents to get aboard Columbia, and soon bring the cultists' downfall ( Sorry, no Super Secret conspiracies to allow it to remain existing ... ).
Columbia's career of stealing goods and people ( don't visit "Cannibal Zombie Columbia" if you can avoid it ) made it MORE than an embarrassment to the Unite State of America. Great effort ( involving National Honor ) would have 'quickly ended' Columbia, so this particular (game's) universe must be one of the 'lucky ones' where Jar Jar Binks had taken over the US Government, or something.
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Cobblestone Streets and Rock Slab Sidewalks - How Backward, Even For 1893 :
For something built as an Exposition "Show City", to show/expound/highlight the progress of technology and modernity (by America), it is kind of a strange selection (as in ILLOGICAL). But then game developers aren't known for their real understandings of ( or caring for ) reality and "The way things really work".
Perhaps, cobblestone makes it easier to pry up a nice big Stone to hurl at the bigotry-designated "Evil Ones", as Americans routinely/constantly did ( at least according to Ken Levine ).
I say such things to comment upon the cheap "Nostalgia" the game writers employed ( as in rote copying old photographs ) versus a logical progression ( requiring imaginative speculation ) from THAT premise/starting-point on towards having the game reflecting a Society affected by the radical New Technologies.
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==Columbia in Separate Chunks == 
Independant Chunks of Building - Which Float Independently, Move and 'Dock' on a Schedule
Well, when you have so much magic fantasy, all considerations of plausibility and safety and engineering fall by the wayside.
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Yeah, A 'Neat Idea' (even if illogical) to have blocks of the city moving independently and reconnecting at different points on a Schedule ( So you want to wait 4 hours before returning from that one shop ? -- Even for lackadaisical Founder Women who have nothing to do but 'shop' every day that is an imposition. )
Anyway : That, and with the other separate floaty sections of the City, you NOW have to guide and coordinate ( and correct ) the SEPARATE 3 Dimensional movements of each chunk 24/7 ( including at night ) - Manually or semi-automatically ( and keep them from ramming into each other - Realtime (today) RR boxcars are bad enough and they bang together all the time) . Remember the maneuvering controls and auto-pilots ( and whatever ) there are all run on gears and maybe electric relays ( Sorry, Quantumz aren't smart ) and are subject to catastrophic human errors of all sorts ( and that OVER DECADES ).
(( But, But, But, "It is Only A Game" .... Yeah and having 'Gumby and The Giant Garfield God' in Call of Duty (CoD) would still be "Only A Game", but too would be incredibly stupid. ))
(( Its Its Its an Allegory !!! For the 1912 Evil Religious American Racist Whiteman - Yeah, Right, and Ken Levine is a giant hedgehog named "Spiney Norman". Seriously, Pee Wee Herman shits bigger than this kind of feeb garbage. ))
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Self-Afflicted Stupidity - 'You Think Rapture's Transit Was Bad ... : 
In Columbia you have Circulating Floating Buildings that only come around a few times a day. And 'step lively' or you'll get you feet crushed by the docking plates, or fall over its unprotected edge ( 15000 feet to your screaming death ). Oh, you could still take a barge or a Gondola thingee ?? Why not JUST use those ALL the time then, and avoid the ridiculous wait, and alot of air and motion sickness ( and how exactly did the utilities work (connect to) on those independently floating blocks anyway ? ) What kept them from crashing into each other, or the Vox hijacking one and menacing the city with it ? 
Oh, yeah, it looked 'neat' and was a 'wondrous' concept, but then so do alot of bizarre dreams of insane people ( and lame-arsed game writers ). 
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Fantasy In, Fantasy Out.Fantasy In, Fantasy Out - "Garbage in Garbage out" a saying about computers in general
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==The Columbia Choo Choo== 
ToyTransport.jpg|No loading along here, so why so Close to the Ground ?
ToyTransit3.jpg|Weird needless track curvings - Just 'looks better' for a game animation.
ToyTransit2.jpg|Strange that THESE Skylines we can't access - Yes YOU are 'Lead-by-the-Nose Player Cattle ... 
FauxEconomy.jpg|Mega-Factor goods going to Where ?
What drives the box(car) things on Columbia's Skyline Skyway ? Quantumz, I guess, makes the rails float, but WHAT makes the things on the Skyline move ? Quantalocomotion Magic Skyline - "Locomotion particles" !!!! Once the story crutch quantum shit is there, you might as well use it ... No ???
A Cable or Chain inside the rail ? Single speed and cable lines don't do too good turning corners. It requires increasing numbers of rollers to hold the cable away from its trackway, and fancier grabber/clutch mechanisms to work properly. That means nice (expensive) high-maintenance too ( and REMEMBER, when THIS thing fails, you can plummet to your death ... )
Hooking onto the cable is a complex mechanism -- Google "Cable Car Grip" if you want to know. That is needed on every single 'box'. You also have to support the weight of the box vehicle somehow upon those rails - They have that all magically done too, I suppose. Control/coordination is one of the most critical of all needs in such a transport system, and these 'trains' have no crew apparent. Neither are there manned control stations to be seen. Real world, this results in out of control crashed boxcars and destroyed/damaged cargo ( and whatever the wreckage might fall upon and crush/damage/maim/burn ).
If the cars could be made to float, then WHY need rails at all - Yay, sky trains !!! Oops, Except there's that vision they had of the Player wingin it through some RollerCoaster-thing, blasting away at stuff.
What was in the promotional trailers looked neat, but was largely eliminated from the game. It is too bad we didn't get THAT.
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Feeble Transportation Within Columbia :
We SEE no passenger use on the Skyway. It is an incredible lack for something so obvious when it is something that ties those chunks of city together.
The "EL" (elevated railroad) system in New York City in 1880 carried 800,000 passengers a day. 
New York Subways in year 1904 carried 400 million passengers a year ( Not today's, in its first decades ... ) later by 1912 had a ~600 miles system and carried 2 Million passengers a day.
Compare to Raptures 3 miles across with total 20000 people, and who knows how few Columbia Nest-o-Cultists Flying Ark had.
Like most transit systems, they couldn't pay for themselves - subsidized. But we have a weird economy in Columbia - magical - so it is not a problem in such Fantasy.
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The logical ( the Skyway which seems to go everywhere ) primary system in Columbia ( which is lacking a road system ) is NOT even shown to carry passengers ( supposed use of that Skyhook thing is an absurdity for any such ). They could have had passenger cars there sitting unused due to the False Shepherd Alert ( or somesuch plausible excuse ). They could even have a scene of a bunch of Cops/Paramilitary arrive near Booker on a Skyline Train ( a pre-canned scene ).
They could still have the same 'disabled cars' thing as needed for an excuse for why Booker/Elizabeth couldn't use a particular line/route.
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Yes, for Personal 'Transportation' ..... DEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP !!!!!!
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ELEVATORS
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All that Building Verticalness required the Game have LOTS of Elevators. Some Elevators (ex- Shantytown's) shows lots of inhabited levels between - WITH NO WAY TO GET TO THEM in the game. 
Stairs would be the default inter-level method (even when Elevators exist) to facilitate any real use.
We repeatedly see Elevators in the 'game' paths. Oddly, they are Derpy Single shaft 'choke points' - a BAD design - an intentionally restricted game-limiting use ( for Linear Maze Player Control ). The game utilizes these to show off static scenes, and for some controlled dialog events. 
A few intermediate floors would have been fun.
Recall that Welcome Center in BS1 had a Hotel area with a bank of no less than 6 elevators.
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Real World Things Just Were Ignored :
Transport called a "Funicular"https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/funicular. These steep-climbing tracked mechanisms existing well before 1893 Columbia. This one was used (starting in 1901) to lift people from the ground foreground, UP about 100 feet to roads/residences above on the hill ( This was before Autos, and what would have been a long Trolley trip or pedestrian stairs climb in hilly LA. LATER, THEY ACTUALLY REMOVED THE WHOLE HILL ).
Note - This is structurally well-supported ( as REAL and Realistic things actually are ).
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Real World 1905 
Here Years after 1893 -- Horses still used, and lots of People, and clutter. Crude ( by modern standards ) machinery which still should have been the tone of Columbia ( even the 'nitty-gritty' spots like Shantytown looked purpose built ).
The ambient crudeness in the World was why Columbia would NOT 'look' ( even with 'prophesy' ) too far into the future to be all so 'Exceptional', and it did often further go BACKWARDs ... ( Being a copycat/clone of "The White City"/Coney Island styling was bizarre enough. ) The game content is as schizophrenic as like : Having those Reactionary Cultists living in a City ( and all modernist ) - WHEN you would expect Luddite-ism and Ruralism. THEN having the gamemakers have these Racists illogically populate the place with problematic immigrants and minorities, AND have that threat MENACE the Pure Holy White inhabitants of their "Eden"/"Ark". 
Infinite BS - "That is alot of BS "
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I could see something like this being on that Skyline ( It is circa 1915, so easily possible ). Too logical for Infinite BS ? Or too problematic for the Game Engine ( or their game effect scripting skills ) ??? Note how all the transport was 'Open' around the Player ...
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Things started moving pretty fast (after 1893). Too bad Columbia didn't keep up with them.
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Top of the line Ship when Columbia started. Obsolete by the time of the Game. Technology was changing fast.
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Pipes Are Transport Too - Aren't They ??
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Shouldn't there be the same for Power Lines ???
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Bombs Being Transport ?
What happens when they hit the ground ?
Maybe this wasn't the greatest idea. ( "game writers" .... )
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Odd Balloon Things
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==Elevators Are Transport==
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Rowboats ?
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There are hints that someone at the game company (or a concept artist) thought somewhat logically : That the Skyline Should have Moved People in a normal workable way ( Not hanging by one arm like an ape zipping along ). But that idea never was realized, other than a few props and the disconnected maze of badly conceptualized crap took over for the forced maze Shooter-Centric game.
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Antiquated Means for 1912. Disconnected City Sections and So Many Stairs made these near useless.
Perhaps if they had a way to rig them to be carried by the Skylines ???
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