Excuses to move my "space city" to an aerostat?

My graphic novel involves a large flying city on a Venus-like planet. Yes, I have done my research, and for various reasons it will be an aerostat-hibrid megastructure: a metaphor for the elaborate and expensive man-made islands around Dubai "“ a status symbol of impractical engineering. Please notice the question is not how but WHY.

I am looking for worldbuilding reasons WHY this city was constructed, and the unique set of circumstances that make it viable. In other words, what problem was solved by building a large luxury aerostat in a compromised atmosphere, as opposed to a more common space harbor or moon-based colony?

Some background:

• The city is a corporate trade hub, and is a Libertarian paradise of luxury rentals and cheap domestic servants. The city has a Metropolis-esque division of wealthy families living on top of an unseen labor class.
• The star system is a choke point along a strategic trade route (FTL travel takes months, and involves "jumping" from star to adjacent star).
• The city has control over the star system, and they have politically destabilized surrounding systems (pirates, despots, etc). They support a syndicate-created scarcity of resources that doesn't touch them.
• There are no other habitable planets in the system. There is a profitable (exploitative) metal asteroid mining operation which was the original "oil money" of the city.
• I am not interested in debating the feasibility of the structure, thank you.
• My world is not hard sci-fi. Everyone is human. It's thousands of years in the future.

I offer some loose reasons I think the structure might be better off flying in an atmosphere rather than in space:

• Politics "“ the city's location is politically advantageous avoiding taxes/criminal justice of an established government.
• Astrophysics "“ solar radiation or frequent meteor storms make an atmospheric canopy necessary.
• Gravity "“ Space is fine for the working class, but wealthy people refuse to live in bad gravity.
• Defense "“ The city is less vulnerable to attack with a planet at its back. Since they undermine other sovereignties, they have many enemies.
• Security "“ Removing the city from the space harbor creates physical distance from terrorists and rebels (and riff raff, NOCD).

I need to show that this structure is elaborate and expensive, but circumstances make it viable or necessary.

posted over 7 years ago

wetcircuit‭

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