lifeless city- what's wrong?

[filiousf 0]

so, I have started a new city, but nobody is living there. I've put a power plant, water- all the basics for starting a city, it is also linked up by a nearby highway, and i have waited a year but still no development. What is wrong and why is no-one coming to live here?!

[simcitygamer 0]

have you tried making some residental zones? or som comerce and industri? sims wont move to your city if there's no places to work...

[filiousf 0]

yes, i've zoned residential, commercial and industry, and its just the industry that is developing

[soldyne 111]

welcome to simtropolis first of all

would it be possible for you to take a few pictures of your city so we can see your layout? there could be any one of many things going on that would cause your city to lack growth. it could be the way the transit network is set up, it could be the power is not being transmitted properly to all zones, it could be taxes, it could be many things. a picture says a thousand words. and many pictures say a novel!

[filiousf 0]

Next time i play ill take some pictures, I should have them by tomorrow

[DOXXP29 5]

Maybe they just hate you! : ) Seriously, what are your residential taxes set at? I usually keep everything at the default 9% when starting a city and I don't seem to have many problems, but if you're having trouble getting simps to move in, try lowering your residential taxes to 8 or 8.5 and see if that makes a difference. Also, make sure they're close enough to the workplace and have a decent transportation hookup. Keep in mind that when a city starts, the simps are poor and uneducated. They can't afford to drive very far and can't afford the higher cost transportation methods such as the monorail. Keep the residential areas somewhat close to the jobs and put in some bus stops to help them along. I find when starting a city, the biggest keys to development are transportation and taxes. All of the other amenities can come later. Put in at least an elementary school somewhat early to educate the simps so they can rise to R$$ status and be qualified for more jobs. And please do show us some pix. We can take a look at what's going on and provide some better advice. For example, you say you put in a highway. It's early in your city's growth to need a highway. Where does it go? Does it connect to another city? Do you have your industry n one side of the map and your residential on the other connected by a highway? (If so, that's probably a good bit of your problem) Visuals will definitely help. We can see what's going on and show you that your simps really DON'T hate you after all! Good Luck! Hope this helped some.

[jamezz_2005 5]

we need to see a pic first - upload one

[filiousf 0]

Sorry, but I couldn't get pictures, but I can show you a diagram- hope you can understand it.
This is the industrial area, more later
R=roads
S=streets
H= highways/ avenues
I= high density industrial areas
I= high density industrial development
P= power lines/ power plant
All areas are watered
IIIIIISIIIIIISIIIIIISII
IIIIIISIIIIIISIIIIIISII
IIIIIISIIIIIISIIIIIISII
IIIIIISIIIIIISIIIIISII
SSSSSSSSSSS
IIIIIISIIIIIISIIIIIISII
IIIIIISIIIIIISIIIIIISII
IIIIIISIIIIIISIIIIIISII
IIIIIISIIIIIISIIIIIISII
IIIIIISIIIIIISIIIIIISII
IIIIIISIIIIIISIIIIIISII
SSSSSSSSSSS       and so on with the streets, which would fill the gaps below
IIIIIISIIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIIISIIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIIISIIIiII IIIIII II
IIIIIISIIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIIIS IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIIIS IIIIII IIIIII II
HHSHHSHH Highway leading to intersection which takes you in the city and out of it.
HHSHHSHH
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
SSSSSSSSS
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
SSSSSSSS
IIIIII IIIIIII IIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II 
SSSSSSSS
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
IIIIII IIIIII IIIIII II
PPPRRPPPPPPPP
I know this message was long, but that is an idea of my industrial part of the city. This took long, so i'll do the residential & commercial tommorrow, meanwhile, i'll see if I can spot the problem myself.

[Neddiggis 1]

if your zoning high density thats probably your problem. Start with low density and you should see lots of development. You will not get high density development till you reach a certain (no idea what) population. Try med density industrial too. or Ag.

[Jasoncw 11,839]

Light industrial can also grow on the dense zones, just just spent money that you didn't need to, but that's not the problem.

To take a screenshot, use the games camera, and then find the pictures at C:\Documents and Settings\Jason\My Documents\SimCity 4\Albums   and then attach them to your next post.

Your industrial set up sounds ok so far, so the problem is probably somewhere else.

[City2TheMax 3]

I've had this problem recently, at least with low wealth/density residential.

1. What size are the residential zones?

2. What are your taxes set to?

If you answer these questions it might help a bit. The problem with mine was that the zones were only 1X1. No one wanted to move into those. When I changed them to 1X2, they started moving in.

[cityspade 0]

Is your highway the only link between your industry and your residential? If so, make sure you place on-ramps in both zones so your sims can trvel inbetween them.

[jamezz_2005 5]

send us a picture take a snapshot in the game and use http://tinypic.com/ as an image host

[filiousf 0]

[filiousf 0]

Hope you can see them because I can't.

[xxbydesign 1]

nope... can't see them.  Mayve they were too small, cause I do see two little dots in your previous post.  Is there a link to your image host you can give us if they won't show up in the forums?

[hym 358]

Nope, they aren't too small; actually, at 1024x768, they are oversized and subject to deletion. If you're using IE, the reason you can't see them is because they are in .png format and IE can't display those images for some reason.

[Frankie_Grove 32]

I see the pics........and it seems to me you are getting ahead of yourself city wise.......

[RiverCocytus 0]

Offhand, I would say that the highway connection is not the problem. IF you have demand R$ will hop on, and then abandon if they can't find work.

Also, your Avenues MUST have crossways in order to work. You MUST drag a road across them or they are essentially one-way roads.

I've seen such things before, where someone overzones initially. Try laying out the plan but not putting in so many d**n zones. Also, without any kind of amenities, the desirability will remain low, making it hard to attract people.

Start a little smaller, and use more roads instead of streets. The streets, unless you're NAM'ed up will have too low of a capacity and transit times will be too long to support much of a population.

Ya dig?

[DOXXP29 5]

One thing jumps out at me, Filiousf. On your avenues, especially in the industrial and commercial zones, where you have a street intersecting, bring the street THROUGH the avenue. This way, trafic can access from both directions to both sides of the avenue. Also, it provides a place to turn aroung. I see you have some road cuts for turnarounds, but sometimes the lazy, idiotic simps won't drive the extra couple of tiles. Try this and see if you notice a change. I had the same problem at one time. I cut the streets through and it made a massive difference. Avenues are kinda funny, anyway. I've noticed industrial doesn't adapt quite as well as commercial to avenues. Seems like it has something to do with the trucks. I've used the route query on my cities with avenues in the industrial areas and the trucks take a really convoluted route to get the freight out. I posted some pix in a thread a few months ago with some really weird truck routes. Check it out if you can find it. EDIT: Sorry, RiverC! I just noticed you said the same thing. It's been a long day and my scanning powers aren't what they should be!