Artemis- The City of Hope

[DrCapone 0]

Welcome to my first attempt at a city journal. I've been taking lots of notes the last few months and think I am finally ready to take on the challenge.

For me this journal will be an opportunity for me to learn more about how to create cities, and hopefully get some feedback on how I'm doing so far. Please comment on how I'm doing. Give me suggestions for BAT's and mods. Tell what I do well and what I could do better.

I'm not trying to create a profitable city (indeed I will probably resort to a money cheat) and I'm not trying to create a realistic city. I just want to have some fun creating an interesting story about a (hopefully) interesting city.

The map used in this CJ is one I stole from the STEX back when I first started playing. It's the Banks Peninsula by flamesrock that I will be wantonly modifying as I go along to make a more interesting landscape for me to play with. I hope he doesn't mind...

Hope you enjoy.

[DrCapone 0]

Episode 1- A New Hope

Maxisland had grown at an alarming rate. Soon all the available land in the region was taken up by towering skyscrapers and international airports. Even the wealthy corporation owners began to tire of the endless commerce and ugliness.

In this land there was a handful of visionaries who had grown up in one of the big cities of Maxisland and now longed for something more. They decided that they would leave this smog filled region and find a new land.

The new land would be one filled with wonder and hope. They would construct their own beautiful city to fill this land. It would be a city of hope.

Unfortunately, this group had spent their whole life in Maxisland. When they spoke of the city of hope, they hoped for wealth, beauty and (of course) some way to keep all those damn poor people out.

Yes, their land of hope was one that catered to the rich. Golf courses, private education and wealthy hospitals that performed only cosmetic surgery. That would be the Artemedian dream.

(Awesome region by the way. I'm looking forward to developing it... thanks go to flamesrock for creating it)

As the new citizens arrived at the future sit of Artemis they decided to spice up the bay a little bit, and spent a lot of the money they had inherited from their grandparents on creating a few islands in the Bay of Hope. The result was this:

And so the new residents of Artemis held an epic thumb-war competition to see who would be the mayor of the new city.  The winner was, of course, the evil Dr Capone. (He cheated).

With his new mayorly powers Dr Capone placed his residence on the tip of the small spur of land on the north side of the Bay of Hope. He had instantly recognized the future value of this land and intended to stake his claim early. Unfortunately for him, because of his dastardly conduct during the thumb-war competition,  his wealthy friends refused to build their houses on the same estate. The unused land was quickly swarmed upon by some of the unwealthy population that had followed the settlers from Maxisland.

Dr Capone was forced to by neighbors with the very people that had caused them to leave Maxisland in the first place.

As part of the vision the first settlers had, they constructed a large educational complex on the coast east of Dr Capone's house. Their vision included quality education for all the children of Artemis and a safe environment in which they could learn. The complex contains both a primary school and a highschool, the local library and a museum containing many  worthless artifacts the settlers had brought with them from Maxisland. The complex was surrounded to the east and the south by playing fields and parks for the enjoyment and recreation of all the students.

They named it Education Park.               (What can I say, they're rich and uninventive)

The rich folk who were still shunning Dr Capone quickly began to establish homes in the suburb to the south of Education Park. An unknown Baron moved into a swanky new mansion just off the main coast road.

And as the wealthier people began to move into the suburb north of Education Park the small settlement really began to take off, with the population already approaching 1000.

The planning of Artemis was heavily focussed on a relaxing atmosphere, with plenty of trees and parks. However, someone definitely got fired from the town council for placing the new skate park right next to what was the busiest intersection in the new town.

Things were going well for the new town. Even the mayor was feeling better after he established the new police force. Their first building was a small kiosk placed near the mayor's house to try and drive up prices on the peninsula. And it worked. Soon he got rid of those disgraceful poor people and started getting more respectable neighbors.

And so everything is good in the town of Artemis. Until the greedy mayor raises taxes on the poor and kills the growth in his town. Find out more in the next episode.

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Thanks for reading so far, any comments are appreciated. 10 internets to everyone who also thinks that the title to this episode is hilarious. More soon.

[Mike the Mayor 51]

Nice start, it will be interesting to see how this one develops.

[homeandaway 1]

great start and cool pics!

always looking forwards to seeing more of your great work my friend

take care

~alex~

[Craig91 12]

I know we've only sdeen a tiny bit so far but you should download some buildings off the STEX, there are ones that give small cities a lot of character

[Schulmanator 5,799]

You are off to a nice start.

[DrCapone 0]

Wow! Thanks everyone for posting some comments. It's pretty awesome to log on and see that people have replied already....

CraigKingofIreland: I've downloaded a few buildings and a couple of mods that you will definitely see later (I'm an absolute sucker for fancy highways...) but I'm having trouble finding what I want easily on the STEX.

Is there any way I can browse for EXACTLY what I want, as in look through low density commercial lots, or medium density residential instead of the broad category of RESIDENTIAL? I just find that the majority of things on the STEX are high density skyscrapers and huge residential towers...not what I'm really looking for.

Any tips on this for Episode 3 or 4?

Thanks again guys and I will post episode 2 tonight before I retire to bed. (I love lazy Sundays when you don't have anything else to do but play around on the computer...)

Dr Capone (evil mayor?)

[DrCapone 0]

Episode 2- "Greed is Right, Greed Works."

With the population growing the need for a health clinic became apparent. One was constructed hastily across the road to the east of Education Park in a small commercial area.  The mayor noted with some displeasure that the neighborhood down that way was starting to look a little....shabby.

His solution? A police station. Hey, it worked before, right?

However this time it didn't work. All it did was make people in the area feel more safe. And so the mayor devised his next evil plan. He resorted to an old strategy, well tested in time, and approved a new building for the area...

Behold, the new church! Situated down the road to the east of the new police station was the mayor's new plan for "controlling" the lower classes. He recently learned on the internet that religion was the way that governments control the working class. It was on the internet, it must be true.

Unfortunately, the internet didn't really have a How-to guide for Dr Capone to follow, so he didn't do too well. The slums kept appearing all over his beautiful town. And so he hatched Plan B.

Plan B

1. Raise taxes for poor people.
2. Laugh maniacally.

It was a plan so crazy it just might work. But....

The result: stagnation. No one moved into his town, no industries, no new companies and no new people. The growth over the next year was so dismal that all the other original settlers started talking about ditching Dr Capone out of office. He had to do something.

In desperation he lowered taxes across the board. 8% then 7% then 5...nothing worked. There wasn't any wealthy people around to buy land, and everyone else was wary of the wildly fluctuating tax rates.

Then day after a long meeting with a disgruntled town council, Dr Capone hit upon the right answer.

Plan C

Overview: If you can't keep the poor people out, or get rid of the ones already here, just make them not poor

1. Better health care.
2. Better education.
3. Laugh Maniacally.

So, a new hospital:

And a revamp of good old Education Park.

Education Park now had a College! Now Education Park frequently echoes with the noise of frat parties and mindless chants of "EPC, EPC, EPC!" during sporting competitions.

Also note what must have been the really difficult job of changing the orientation of the soccer pitch overnight. The gardeners really worked hard there.

The town council had a hard time buying back the land for these extensions. In fact they had tried to purchase the mysterious Baron's manor so they could make it part of Education Park. The Baron had refused them in what I'm sure was a very mysterious way. So they had been forced to revamp the grounds around his manor and the two slum apartment blocks he apparently owned.

With the new modifications to the healthcare and education system the town was back on it's feet. The life expectancy and education levels in the community soared and the demand for more jobs and cleaner industries led to a new population boom.

And so Artemis was once again on track to becoming a bustling little city.

The mayor's first ten years in office was celebrated by an amazing fireworks display. When questioned about his actions over the last decade by the local newspaper (name pending), Dr Capone said the following, "The main thing about money, Bud, is that ____________________." * (See below)

But Dr Capone still remembers the trouble made by this mysterious Baron character. He was a little too mysterious....

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Wow, this is kinda fun making up stories to go along with your city. The whole thing is kind of true though, I got sick of poor people moving in and destroyed my own economy. The only way I could really fix it is by building the college and hospital to increase the quality of life. I know now that it's really bad for all your RTI things to be in the negative.

Next episode: Dr Capone starts Plan 2-A!

* (From above) The first person to post the rest of this quote will play a part in the next episode...