KATTENDEN, DUNCANHEIM – Light clouds rolled off the ocean and seagulls clamored overhead as Prince Thorbenicos, third son of the Thetheyda, dug a small ditch on the side of Highway A3 in Lestelkay-e today, in the groundbreaking ceremony of an unprecedented new infrastructure project. The project, approved by the Council of Chieftains after considerable debate and redraft by both legislative houses, will construct a motorway ring around three sides of the capital city of Kattenden and its environs. Several new bridges over the River Katten, and one over the River Yudok-ee are also planned. These bridges are necessitated by the ultimate conclusion that a motorway in the northern reaches of the city could not be driven through the densely populated south bank, and therefore will be built on the more rural northern side.

Prince Thorbenicos spoke at the ceremony, stating that the new motorway represents a “drive forward into a new and improved future, as we strive to further modernize our proud and cultured nation.” He went on to speak at length about his great-grandfather’s famous fear of automobiles and said that “while his perhaps overreactive paranoia did ultimately result in our country having one of the most carbon-neutral transportation networks in the world for the duration of the 20th century, in the 21st we must move forward. Most of our cars are electric anyway, so it won’t harm the environment.”

It was at this point that an environmentalist farmer from the village of Sashene in the rural Tyndurland region of Greater Kattenden interrupted the Prince, shouting, “What about the environment of my farm?”

Prince Thorbenicos assured the farmer that everything will be fine, then continued the ceremony with an invocation to the Earth.

Reporters from the Daily Yelkaretlis spoke to the farmer afterward and discovered that the motorway is currently planned to go directly through his farm, splitting it in two and paving over most of the rest of it for a motorway exit to serve the nearby village, a plan which he intends to fight.

The ceremony concluded without further interruption, and, by nightfall construction crews from the Ministry of Transportation had completed a couple hundred meters of paving.

Construction is scheduled to be completed by 2024.

UPDATE: This article was updated in December 2022 to report that the Sashene section of the planned motorway has been altered to avoid crossing the farm mentioned.