Do I really need these?

[NYCorBUST 0]

When it comes to the workings in my city I have a couple of planning questions:

FIRE STATIONS
Do I really need these? I have maybe one in each city, and never have a fire.
Does it relieve demand caps? or do anything for growth?
Does it truely make people not want to live there because there is only one Fire Station?

MUSEUMS/LIBRARIES
Do I still need them when I have the Main library and Opera house?

POLLUTION
My cities have grow to huge sky scraper potentional, and now I have heavy pollution my roads/avenues. I have the ordinences enacted.Do I need to start putting two one way roads instead of avenues then put trees down the middle?
I can't really find another way to drop the city pollution?
I have subways and trains too.
What else can I do?

Is there anything else I can rid of after some gifts have been recieved?

Thank you all so much!

[paperboy15 4]

Fire stations...now my strategy is to place them only where fires break out. I never place them to provide coverage for the whole city since you can place them as soon as a fire starts (very realistic, I know). In my latest city, which is now up to 60,000 (sprawled out over a large city tile), I have had three fires in three different locations, so I have three fire stations.

Museums and Libraries...I usually don't place these, but they boost the EQ of your older sims. I think the main library and opera house simply provide you with additional benefits (outlined in the official guide) and also the main library relieves the pressure on your branch libraries (you will see usage in the branch libraries drop, but not disappear).

Pollution...short of cheating you can use HOV lanes to block autos and trucks from traveling in certain areas of the city (they only allow buses through). There are also other strategies to force sims to take mass transit. Here are the "lanes" I am talking about: https://www.simtropolis.com/stex/index.cfm?id=1834

Also, place trees in any empty spaces (to place forests, you can hold down CTRL+ALT+SHIFT and click on the god mode button. This will enable the terraform tools (including the forest tool) that were available before you started the city (I used to place trees one by one...and then I found out this trick...it saves so much time!).

[RandomInsanity 0]

I use the no fires and riots mod, I started to get really sick of that stuff after being interrupted from my important work to send 12 firetrucks to one tiny little fire. These are generally the last thing I'll consider for an area, after education, health and police anyways. I imagine however that fire coverage would have some impact on desirability, although I don't know for sure.

[Constantina 5]

My best idea is to cover the whole city with fire protection and fund them to the max. Just build large fire stations as they give the best protection. Optionally, if you don't mind giving up a strip of land, build a landing strip.

For Museums and Libraries, I don't build them early in the game. I do build them on my best cities and in high-density cities.

For pollution, the best way is to tax the dirty industry to 20% and get all the residents to use mass transit. Non-sims like you would be able to transition quite swiftly, but since Sims insist in using cars to go to work, it would be a hard task. Maybe these car-blockers might make them think again.

[soldyne 111]

Fire stations are not "needed" but it nice to have coverage IMHO. no fires will start within the coverage radius of a fire dept. and coverage also increases your overall saftey rating which helps boost desirability and demand. it does nothing for demand caps though.

Museums are good at keeping your older sims educated but I only ever put in about 4 of them so I can get the major art museum and then I stop. Libraries on the other hand are excellent support buildings early on as they give a % boost to EQ in conjunction with elementary schools and high schools. if you manipulate their funding they can be very inexpensive and give a great boost to EQ. I use them everywhere I have a school. but they are not needed.

as far as pollution, mass transit (subways and bus inparticular) are the best way to reduce pollution on the roads. even if you put trees inbetween your roads it would not do too much as it takes a lot of trees to reduce pollution significantly.

[NYCorBUST 0]

See I have transportation hubs ever block:

IE: R = RES; B = BUS; S = Street/ROAD T = Trees

rrrrrr s b s rrrrrr s b s rrrrrr s EL s

rrrrrr s t   s rrrrrr s t  s rrrrrr s EL s

rrrrrr s t   s rrrrrr s t  s rrrrrr s EL s

rrrrrr s b s rrrrrr s b s rrrrrr s EL s

rrrrrr s t   s rrrrrr s  t s rrrrrr s EL  s

rrrrrr s t   s rrrrrr s  t s rrrrrr s EL s

Only HT no ID or IM or IA

and the roads are just caked with pollution.

I then add subways at each busstation 

and  then EL every 3 blocks or so. I tried the best in the diagram.

Ok so the diagram didn't come out so good.

[hamsterTK 93]

My cities always have full fire and police coverage. Dunno, i want some realism and it seems right for your city to have firefighters and cops when your sims need. Like someone else, they help your safety rating.

Museams and libraries, well i do place libraries, but museams only as eye candy.

As for Pollution, my cities all have a ridiculous amount of trees. I built greenways between different neighborhoods. This helps some, and the fact i have amazing bus coverage way out into the suburbs does a lot too. Of course, i never have much luck with subways or trains except if its just one line that funnels the sims on the bus into the city center. Of course, i built rail lines all over the place for realism and coolness.

[paperboy15 4]

"even if you put trees inbetween your roads it would not do too much as it takes a lot of trees to reduce pollution significantly."

True, but beautification is a nice side effect and I'll take all the help against pollution I can get...for my cities I usually have trees all around the edges and surounding the highways that run through the city.  

[jacqulina 162]

i allways use these for realistic purposes

[NYCorBUST 0]

Originally posted by: NYCorBUST See I have transportation hubs ever block:

IE: R = RES; B = BUS; S = Street/ROAD T = Trees

rrrrrr s b s rrrrrr s b s rrrrrr s EL s

rrrrrr s t   s rrrrrr s t  s rrrrrr s EL s

rrrrrr s t   s rrrrrr s t  s rrrrrr s EL s

rrrrrr s b s rrrrrr s b s rrrrrr s EL s

rrrrrr s t   s rrrrrr s  t s rrrrrr s EL  s

rrrrrr s t   s rrrrrr s  t s rrrrrr s EL s

Only HT no ID or IM or IA

and the roads are just caked with pollution.

I then add subways at each busstation 

and  then EL every 3 blocks or so. I tried the best in the diagram.

Ok so the diagram didn't come out so good.

quote>

 

How much more transportation can I get?

[Tolomar 5]

if your not using mods of some sort that affect education...or you want to play in a non-cheat way...these buildings are needed to help you get the larger CO$$$ buildings (or at least the bolster you chances of getting them)...as most are dependant on a certain EQ level...plus both help in cap relief  and like said above...they do make good eye candy lots too...

[fate556 5]

i do the same as Constantina