Help! Need someone who knows more about North American geography than I do!

[sparkindarkness]

As mentioned here: http://sparkindarkness.livejournal.com/204537.html I am running a werewolf game. Because I prefer to stick mostly to game canon and because the game requires the interaction of many many tribes it is to be set in the Americas (European werewolf tribes tend to have their own established territory and multi-tribal septs are rare or limited to maybe 3 tribes. It‘s also easier to shoot them there).

The things is I don't know exactly where to situate it. I want to keep it as close to the real world as possible (makes for less invention and more interesting research - in my last campaign they went Yuma, Arizona to Miami to Townsville, Queensland and I had lots of fun researching them all) but I am willing to tweak things (turn a moderate city into a NYC sized metropolis, for example). But I need somewhere to start.

So, what do I need?

A city moderately close to forested wilderness “close” can be “within 2-3 days solid travel” but more than a week would be pushing it. The wilderness has to be predominantly woodland.

Temperate/cold climate Snows in winter. Has pine trees. That kind of thing. No deserts, palm trees, calypso dancers.

Not somewhere already heavily established in White Wolf’s canon I like the canon, I use it a lot and don’t want to clash with it too badly since I may want to use it. So NOT: NYC, New York State, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago

A Camarilla City So nowhere that is established as Sabbat - so NOT Toronto (rest of Canada’s fine, I never bought the idea of all of Canada being a Sabbat holding - it made NO sense) Detroit, Miami, Mexico

Bonus points
Not essentials but they’d be nice bonuses if possible:

Native wolf population
Wilderness is actually a National Park or similarly legally protected
The city has a history (not necessarily current presence) of organised crime ties


All suggestions gratefully appreciated!


(ETA: I'm going to do brief research on each suggestion and probably post another post on detailed pros and cons of each :))

Comments

[chesh.livejournal.com]

I would say the Twin Cities might work. Lots of varied forested areas around - there's national park that runs next to the Mississippi River almost all through the metro area, and that connects with actual national forest on one side of the city. There are mixed deciduous/conifer forests within a day or two walking distance, lots of prairie, and oak savannah.

There has been some work on reintroducing wolves, though lots of farmers are getting up in arms about it, just like everywhere else.

The city has a long history of mob ties - quite a lot of the caves facing the river were used as mob hideouts during the Prohibition, and a couple of them have been turned into honest clubs.

[sparkindarkness.livejournal.com]

Twin Cities? Is that Minneapolis/St. Paul?

It's certainly big enough. It has a good history of liberal causes the Children would champion - native rights, equal rights, worker's rights. It has resources, economy and everyting up the wazooo.

The only reservation I have is that the forested area looks very... tame? More beautiful touristy area than actually wild. I can see the caern being interrupted by joggers and cyclists and sight see-ers :)