Berlin’s final frontier
by James Glazebrook
As documented by the Star Trek series, New Berlin will be founded on Earth’s moon in about 2069. That’s less than 50 years until Berliners can enjoy a nice shiny new city, hopefully free of English expats, but with all the cultural benefits of their current home. At the Mazurka festival, revelers can get down to Polish folk music in their lederhosen, as fondly recalled by two Starfleet commanders in the video below (jump 2:10 in) – “sausage and beer all around!”
And the clubs on New Berlin are every bit as hedonistic as their Terran counterparts – if this photo snatched at Borghain* is anything to go by:
However, as this Federation Colony grows so large that, by 2373, it can be seen from Earth in the daytime, it’s only a matter of time before Ryanair Galatic arrives to ruin it all. Not to worry – when we inevitably outgrow our new lunar home, we can move onto the star system 
of the same name as depicted in the MMO Freelancer. As you can see on this map, New Berlin includes the picturesque planet of Potsdam, and bases called Bonn Station and Brandenburg Border Station. Fittingly, Kreuzberg Depot is inhabited by “junkers”, “an itinerant population unaffiliated with any colony”, whose commodities include light arms and pharmaceuticals.
Of course, it will take us a while to get there – and it’s not going to be easy. As Moon director Duncan Jones is going to show in his follow-up to Blade Runner, dark days are ahead for the city so loved by his father, David Bowie. But the concept art for Mute indicates that the residents of near-future Berlin will still be able to get their rocks off, at the strip club Fremde Traum (Foreign Dreams):
Time will tell whether future Berlins will have room for “lifestyle tourists” like us, but the city’s current inhabitants can be reassured that their reputation for sleazy thrills will follow them through time and space.
*yeah, so I made this up. But everything else in this post is definitely going to happen.
