Cargotown is a police no-go area in the shadow of the Strait Bridges in Martinez Precinct, and a designated “free fire” zone for the NCPD. Widely acknowledged as the most dangerous of the core’s combat zones, seven years ago it was surrounded by a city-block wide cleared area and an official police-patrolled entry checkpoint was created at the Eastern shore where Martinez meets Docklands.

Cargotown itself spreads over two areas of the waterfront – a pre-Collapse ship-breaking yard and a former warehousing sector which have both sat unused for decades, other than by the homeless of the city and miscreant Zoners who moved in and gave the are it’s infamous character. It is now a shanty town with its own markets, squalid businesses and leaders – built into the hulks of a couple of rusting ships and the remodeled shells of the old warehouses and offices.

Much of Cargotown to the Wo Shing Wo Triad who dominate their from their base in the hulk of a rusting pre-Collapse aircraft carrier which towers over the breaker’s yard – now converted into dorms, warehousing for merchandise, a casino, a brothel and much more. Their territory is the only area North of the Core which doesn’t swear allegiance to the Emir, but the constant police perimeter patrols dissuade both from outright warfare. Still, there are plenty of other petty warlords, gangs, fixers and their bodyguards, lo-lifes with a bit of muscle to back them and the like, all claiming a tiny bit of the zone’s territory and owing titular allegiance to the Triad.

The gate isn’t the only way into Cargotown, of course. Being on the waterfront, it’s easy enough to get small non-metallic boats or submersibles into the zone and over the years the inhabitants have broken into sewer mains, utility conduits and connected basements to provide other passages to landward, for those in the know or with the money to pay one of the many guides.

Cargotown, like the other city Combat Zones, is more dangerous than any run-of-the-mill slum, but it provides a safe haven where the police and even corporate hunters will definitely fear to tread, as well as a marketplace where all kinds of illicit and immoral goods and services can be openly and easily purchased. There is no shortage of traffic across the free-fire zone.