#at MINIMUM it should be gently sloped wide stairs between each level with the next staircase set off to the left

[absentlyabbie]

reading this book and it describes this fantasy tiered city built on the side of a mountain and it has one "impossibly long" stairway for traversing from one tier to another

and all i can think is "wow that is awful urban design."

without even getting into the inherent ableism (but hey! fantasy city with fantasy races which are naturally superior and therefore pretty much never experience disability, of course, because that's what superiority means) of the apparently sole system of traveling between levels of this city being stairs and only stairs, it's a freaking deathtrap.

one impossibly long unbroken stairway across the breadth of a tiered city built into the side of a mountain? no landings are described, even. without some kinda natural break, one moment of clumsiness or an unfriendly shove and someone is having a long, long tumble to a broken neck (and broken everything else.)