San Francisco v2.0

[Patience 0]

If you're trying to figure out what a particular neighborhood looks like, try Mapquest. You can plug in an address and get a map, and then switch to the "Aerial Photo" view to figure out if it's full of mansions or ranch houses.

[eppisgood 6]

Thanks for the tip Patience.

 

I've run into a problem.  Since I've wiped out over 10,000 R$$ by plowing through the (what I thought) were the Berkeley Hills with a bulldozer... a lot of business' went abandon due to the employees being homeless.  Since I was using Orinda as a low wealth support city, it became unneeded as there were little R$$ & R$$$ to cater to.  So I've decided to wipe out Orinda's farmland and start developing the city.  Below is a picture of West Orinda, I've labeled the streets as well as a landmark.  Minotaur420, I'd like your comments, and I'd like to know which neighborhood you live in so I can pay special attention to detail in that area.  I'm going to a bachelor party this weekend in Vegas, so I will start on Orinda when Labor Day weekend concludes.  Drife safely people!

 

[Dereko 0]

There is a funny exit off the 24 named "Fish Ranch Road", don't forget that one.

[ALTX 40]

great work with the bridge!.... ill try to see if i can make the piers without the tall leveling though

[Minotaur420 2]

ummmm....orinda's a little out of scale. You won't be able to fit a whole lot of it. I'd say MIner Road is where that other road near the edge is. Orinda Way goes parallel to Camino Pablo from about the freeway to almost there. That's were Orinda Village is with lots of shops and stuff. There would be golf course in the top right then. Lake Cascade isn't much, just a little thing and part of the country club.The other side of the freeway has theatre square with a few more shops and like 1 small office building. No development the southwest side of camino pablo for about halfway, but across from miner is el toyonal where houses are built up into the hills. Some houses are below moraga way on the other side of the freeway. and all down to the edge of the map.

[bootrungar 0]

Your region looks really good. I started building a Bay Area region from the map included with the game, but I haven't tried to be accurate. Keep up the good work!

[eppisgood 6]

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On 8/30/2003 12:51:21 AM Minotaur420 wrote:

ummmm....orinda's a little out of scale. You won't be able to fit a whole lot of it. I'd say MIner Road is where that other road near the edge is. Orinda Way goes parallel to Camino Pablo from about the freeway to almost there. That's were Orinda Village is with lots of shops and stuff. There would be golf course in the top right then. Lake Cascade isn't much, just a little thing and part of the country club.The other side of the freeway has theatre square with a few more shops and like 1 small office building. No development the southwest side of camino pablo for about halfway, but across from miner is el toyonal where houses are built up into the hills. Some houses are below moraga way on the other side of the freeway. and all down to the edge of the map.

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The other road by the edge is Bear Creek Rd.  Also, maybe you are thinking of Orinda being on a bigger scale because on www.mapquest.com and maps.yahoo.com it shows Miner Rd. being about 2100' north of the 24, shown below.  Plus this is a medium sized map, not a small so that might help visualizing it a little better.  To me it looks like my version of Orinda is scaled correctly for only having Orinda Village & north of the 24 to work with.  Isn't Orinda's center just south of the 24?

I now understand how Camino Pablo makes the transition to Moraga Way, on the south side of the 24, so I'll fix that.  To be clear on the Orinda Village, that is inbetween Orinda Way & Camino Pablo right?  I'll be sure to have a sprawling wealthy suburbs the rest of the area.  I think you'll be pleased with the outcome.

[Psyko 0]

Wow, really nice region, road layout and everything. Something i still gotta learn how to do... I got a good region goin to but not as well as you are... good job

[eppisgood 6]

Here's a new update.  I've been busy with work, friends weddings, and traveling - so I haven't had much time.  But I put in a solid 8 hours between 10pm-12pm this week and I've finished all of Berkeley, Orinda, and West Oakland excluding the docks (but I have the Oakland Army Base).  Parts of downtown Oakland, Oakland Hills, and Albany have been started.  I am basing this purely off what I see on mapquest.com's satellite view, I've never been to most of these places.  I have to say this is the funnest region I've created so far.  Well I'm off to San Francisco, if anyone wants to meet at the game and have a beer click on this link:

 

https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/view.asp?topicID=38967&sessionID=6D8EC68712924BCAA390936CCD677BE7

 

[klafter 0]

don't forget the claremont hotel! It is the basis for the resort hotel reward! The funny thing is that it is in Oakland, but is completely surrounded by berkely on three sides.

[eppisgood 6]

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On 9/12/2003 2:49:17 AM klafter wrote:

don't forget the claremont hotel! It is the basis for the resort hotel reward! The funny thing is that it is in Oakland, but is completely surrounded by berkely on three sides.

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Where abouts is the Claremont Hotel?  I haven't found an address for it.  Here's a cool drawing of it though, I could see the resemblence a little to the resort hotel in the game.

[bootrungar 0]

It's on Highway 13 (Ashby Ave. / Tunnel Rd.) near Claremont Ave. north of Hwy. 24

[klafter 0]

It is right near the university. Practically overlooking it. I'm surprised that is the only picture you could find.

Here's the official website:
http://www.claremontresort.com/

[eppisgood 6]

Thanks for the placement tips guys.  I'm not too familiar with the Berkeley area, and I started building it prior to last weekend when I drove around the area a little.  So Tunnel road, which is practically an extension of the 13, isn't an extension of the 13 in this region.. and it also goes along flatish land and not down the hill like it does in real life.  So alas, I cannot place the Claremont Hotel perching on a hill overlooking UCBerkeley. 

 

If you are travling from the 24 towards Cal, is the Claremont Hotel on the right side of Tunnel Rd or the left?  I am trying to think if I saw it when I was driving..

[dollarbillmontgomery 0]

Sweet city, but I think you should've started San Frans downtown first and then expanded into the surrounding areas. Keep postin' pics

[MoSh316ddp 0]

Nice region its one of the best i have seen=P

[brett_131 0]

GREAT WORK!!! looks great...i like the IHT facotry in your R zone..

[eppisgood 6]

I just purchased Rush Hour today.  Here is the transportation layout for Marin Co.  The freeway is the 101 which travels almost the entire length of the west coast.  Interested fact: highways that have 3 digets usually go through the center of towns while highways & interstates that have 1 digit typically go around the center of town. 

 

[eppisgood 6]

Here is a transportation map of the completed part of Alameda Co.  It'll be another week or so until it's completely finished and then I'll start the big sucker up.

 

 

The diagnol grid between the two freeways west of Mtn View Cemetery isn't there in real life.  The streets are at an awkward angle compared to the freeways in that area so without having horizontal or vertical roads with occasional bends in them (looked hideous) it couldn't have been done.  One thing in RH they could've done is have the ability for streets to be placed at the diagnol.

[eppisgood 6]

Here's a mini update with some close ups.

 

Downtown Oakland

 

Telegraph Ave. Berkeley

 

Orinda

[Minotaur420 2]

looking good man. I think you could add a lot more trees in orinda though, especially like on those rich home properties. I'd have to say that's what really sets orinda apart from every other city around it, except maybe sort of the oakland hills. All those cities to the east have brown, mostly empty hills, but orinda's are covered in trees, which extend up into the oakland hills. But then it's not quite as tree covered once you get to the other side.

 

Also kinda funny, I've never noticed that channel in oakland before.

[FrankBirthday 20]

This is a great region you have constructed! I started one of the bay area too, but gave up quickly when I couldnt fit all the roads in Berkeley between the water and the hills. I also had started edited lots of UC Berkeley and the Public Gardens on the hill but the stupid Lot editor erased both after about 5 hours of work.

Could you post a close up of Berkeley just north of campus (my neighborhood)

Great Job once again!!!!

[frogface 352]

very realistic region! i started my region on the san fransisco map but i have to say it looks nothing like yours!

[eppisgood 6]

Minotaur, after looking at the regional overview pic and downloading some pictures of Orinda, I agree.  But unfortunately something has happened in Orinda that makes my computer slow to a crawl.  I haven't added anything to Orinda in quite some time but I do occasionally let it run for 8-10 years to let it adjust to the neighboring demographics... but the last time I tried to let it "level itself out" it barely moved more than 2 weeks on Cheetah mode in the span of 2 real life minutes... so I can't bare to play that city anymore.  I can't think of what it could be and I don't have the patience to figure it out in suuuuuuuuuper slow motion.  I am sorry...

 

The channel in Oakland is probably a little smaller than that... you can see it in the picture below.

 

 

FrankBirthday, I got frustrated too by not being able to make those off angle roads from the Hills down to the bay.  I think I missed a major street or two as well.  Oh well, I think it looks close enough.  Here is that picture of the residential neighborhoods north of UCBerkeley.  I haven't been there but I assume it has nice plush looking homes.. am I right?

 

 

The next two pictures are overview pictures of the easy bay because it's as complete as it's going to get until after I complete the city of San Francisco.

 

Satellite Three Quarters View:

 

Transportation View:

 

The only places I didn't complete were the Airport and the retired Naval base on the west end of Alameda.  Enjoy...

[eppisgood 6]

Now I will start on the City of San Francisco... boy this is a beautiful city and I hope I can capture it's charm and elegance with my city creating skills.  Here is the city map that I will use to recreate the transportation & landmarks of San Francisco.

The scenic drive won't be featured but you bet I'll have BART included.

 

[brett_131 0]

Looks AMAZING!!!

 

good luck with that!!

[DuskTrooper 314]

Niiice!  Keep it up!  Does you computer perform well, though? 

[eppisgood 6]

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On 10/4/2003 1:20:30 PM DuskTrooper wrote:

Niiice!  Keep it up!  Does you computer perform well, though? 

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It performs pretty smoothly except for in the map of Orinda.

The portion of yesterday that wasn't spent sobbing over the Giants playoff hopes getting squashed I started developing downtown San Francisco. Well the streets at least. This took me over 5 hours to complete but I got most every street included (I missed Grant, Sacramento and maybe one or two others) and nailed which direction they went and what portions of the street go that direction.

Here are some close ups so you can read the names of the streets and see the directional changes of each street.  I couldn't get Lombard to do the one way street down the hill on a slope, I tried various ways.. sorry.

The confusion of one way streets in San Francisco...

[comdude21 6]

Incredible job eppisgood, certainly the best real city remake I have ever seen (and there are some good ones)!

[eppisgood 6]

Thanks.  All though the New York City remake will be looking as good if not better once the urban sprawl is completed.  He has Manhattan down to the "n".  I tried a NYC region the first thing I did when I got SC4 but since I've never been there I knew it sucked ass.  I tried to do a Chicago region too but couldn't remember much of what it looked like.

 

When I start on the population of San Francisco I'll be using only the Chicago & New York tilesets because there aren't a lot of "new age" buildings in SF like there are in Houston.  I want to give people the feeling that they are actually IN San Francisco when they view the screenshots.