The Town That Lives Inside One Building

On a cold, grey bay along the Alaskan coastline stands a town called Whittier, where almost the entire population lives under one roof, quite literally, packed inside the very same towering building. It is, without much exaggeration, a whole community folded into a single address.

Na hladnom, sivom zaljevu duž obale Aljaske stoji gradić po imenu Whittier, gdje gotovo cjelokupno stanovništvo živi pod jednim krovom, doslovno, smješteno unutar iste visoke zgrade. To je, bez pretjerivanja, cijela zajednica sabijena na jednu jedinu adresu.

That building rises fourteen storeys and was originally constructed for the army, decades ago, long before it became a town in its own right. It now houses flats, a shop, a post office, a police station, a small clinic, and even a church, so that the mayor, the local doctor, and whoever happens to sell you milk all live stacked one above another. Long internal corridors connect every floor, which is fortunate, because Whittier receives a truly formidable amount of snow each winter, and residents can go about most of daily life without ever pulling on a coat. Even the children reach school through a tunnel dug beneath the ground.

Ta zgrada ima četrnaest katova i izvorno je izgrađena za vojsku, prije desetljeća, davno prije nego što je sama postala grad. Danas u njoj su stanovi, trgovina, pošta, policijska postaja, mala ambulanta, pa čak i crkva, tako da gradonačelnik, lokalni liječnik i tko god ti prodaje mlijeko svi žive naslagani jedni iznad drugih. Dugi unutarnji hodnici povezuju svaki kat, što je sreća, jer Whittier svake zime dobiva doista golemu količinu snijega, a stanovnici mogu obavljati većinu svakodnevnih poslova a da nikada ne obuku kaput. Čak i djeca do škole stižu kroz tunel iskopan ispod zemlje.

Getting into the town at all is stranger still. Cars enter through a single narrow tunnel blasted through the mountainside, a tunnel shared with the railway, which means everybody must take turns. At night the tunnel closes altogether, and nothing moves in or out until morning. The town simply stays where it is, warm and lit against the dark, one tall building standing alone in the snow, ringed by mountains on every side.

Sam ulazak u grad još je neobičniji. Automobili ulaze kroz jedan jedini uski tunel probijen kroz padinu planine, tunel koji se dijeli sa željeznicom, što znači da svi moraju čekati red. Noću se tunel potpuno zatvara, i ništa ne ulazi ni izlazi do jutra. Grad jednostavno ostaje ondje gdje jest, topao i osvijetljen usred tame, jedna visoka zgrada koja samotno stoji u snijegu, okružena planinama sa svih strana.