Merak Vallis
What Merak Vallis is
Merak Vallis is a vallis — a valley — on Venus, 200 km across, centred at 63.5° S, 162.0° E in the Henie quadrangle. It is the 766th largest named feature on Venus and the 62nd largest of its class there.
Where the name comes from
Balochi (Pakistan) river deity. The International Astronomical Union approved the name in 1997, under the theme it applies to every vallis on Venus. Of the 72 features of this class catalogued on Venus, the naming categories run Egypt (3), China (3), India (3), Mayan (2).
What it would take to settle Merak Vallis
Venus scores 43 as a world. That number is the same for every square metre of it — but sunlight, water, radiation and the ground under your feet are not. This is the same question asked at 63.5° S, 162.0° E.
What this spot has going for it is known ground — 6,072 km from Vega 2 (1985). What works against it is water — same as everywhere else on this world.
Computed from Merak Vallis's catalogued latitude, longitude and feature class — 74% of the model's weight had a basis here, and 2 axes were dropped as not applicable to Venus (radiation geometry, earth link). Gravity, pressure, delta-v and distance from the Sun are the same everywhere on Venus and are already counted in the world's own index, not again here.
What this cannot see: elevation. Slope, local shadowing and the polar “peaks of eternal light” — ridge tops near the poles of a barely tilted world that catch sun almost continuously while a crater floor kilometres away never does — need a terrain model this does not have. Where a real mission targets a pole, that is usually why.
What is next to it
The largest vallis features on Venus
All 72 valles on Venus — mapped together, with the naming theme and the size distribution.