DTP's "Other Cities"

[deathtopumpkins 43]

The following pictures are from the city of Queensport, capital of the Queen Anne Hills region, which is my largest city at about 640,000 Residential and 550,000 Commercial populations. I have reconstructed some of the highways over the last few days, so I decided to show them off. Thus, the first update will be about the city's highways.

We'll begin by entering the mostly suburban eastern half of the city on the A5 freeway, a.k.a. The King's River Highway. The first exit we pass is Exit 7E, which would take us to MacKensie St., a paralleling avenue.


Shortly after crossing under an overpass, we come to exit 7W, which is the westbound counterpart to exit 7E, and also takes us to MacKensie St. and the surrounding neighborhoods.


After passing several farm fields and the occaisonal suburban neighborhood, we see tall buildings ahead, and signs for exit 8, which is the main exit in these parts. Exit 8 would take you to the International Airport, the Waterview Medical Center, MacKensie St., and provide easy access to the numerous area tunnels.

Westbound traffic only has an exit 8, but eastbound splits it into 8A and B as a dedicated tunnel link, which we'll come back to later.

Just past exit 8, we cross the majestic Queensport Harbor Bridge, situated just south of the mouth of the King's River.

I think I'm going to enter that one in the SC4D picture contest.

Coming off the bridge, we enter downtown, and are surrounded by towering skyscrapers, right in front of exit 9, the main access point into downtown.


After passing exit 9, the A5 is carved into the side of a small cliff, with retaining walls on both sides, but these are interrupted pretty quick by a very compact T interchange with the A505 freeway that heads north into midtown, underground most of the time.


The highway proceeds along in the same surroundings as before exit 10, at least until exit 11E, when it becomes a 4-lane elevated roadway. Exit 11E is a westbound-only exit, and exit 11W is combined with exit 12 about a kilometer west.


Here's a shot of the elevated part:

It can be a pretty bumpy ride at high speeds!

After regaining solid ground, we approach exit 12, which many residents have dubbed "overly complicated." It provides access to the Hilltop district, as well as highway A30, the Tarkusian Parkway ().

We'll exit here, and then turn onto A30 before it swings around a corner and becomes a sunken highway.

Traffic coming off A30 has one exit we don't: exit 0, which provides direct access to the western suburbs VIA A5.


Our first exit is exit 1, which is a T interchange with A130, the Midtown Tunnel Connector, which heads back towards (and eventually under) Midtown.


Immediately after merging from exit 1, the highway spilts agian, for exit 2, which is a high-capacity diamond serving the area known as the west side just southwest of the Financial District.


Several overpasses later, we come to exit 3. Here's where it gets interesting. Exit 3, the A30/A7 interchange, used to be an at-grade intersection. Ouch. Today, at the suggestion of Patricius Maximus, I upgraded it to a modified volleyball interchange.

Before the highway emerges from it's trench, the through lanes branch off to each side and into big dig tunnels. The inside lanes act as exit 3.


The inside 4 lanes then intersect A7's frontage roads above ground level.


After which they widen to 6 lanes and rejoin the rest of the highway underground, leaving this city.
The tunnel portal:


TO BE CONTINUED...

Later we'll take a trip down the A7 and then back to the A5 VIA the Eastern Tunnel and A307

[anarchy0029 2]

Oh man, that is nice... I'll like this CJ. Very urbanated.

[jacqulina 162]

oh wow thats awesome work my friend

[Patricius Maximus 236]

This kind of reminds me of my own Patrician Showcase. You have a great opening, and I see some interchanges that look similar to mine . I love the sloping, and the signs added into the pics.

I also see that you took my suggestion about the volleyball interchange.

Overall a great start.

- Patricius Maximus

[SimHoTToDDy 2,938]

Looking great! Highways are something that are seriously lacking in the interchange department. Anyway, excelent work and I hope to see more.

Best of luck with images, my Imageshack stuff is going through random "blackouts" where images are 100% black. So I feel your pain with image problems.

[penguin007 27]

Nice cities there your RHW interchanges all look very nice

Will

[penguin007 27]

Nice cities there your RHW interchanges all look very nice

Will

[deathtopumpkins 43]

anarchy0029: Thanks. It's my first attempt at a really big city.

jacqulina: Thanks!

Patricius Maximus: That was my inspiration.  Gotta love the slope mod, and I thought the signs would be neat to add to the captions. A slight note about them though: They are all taken from the highway we're traveling on at the time, almost always in our direction.

It came out looking more like a diamond, but I guess it's still a volleyball. I'm fixing the image as I speak.

SimHoTToDDY: Thanks!

Well, with the RHW that won't be true for much longer. More is coming. This update's only halfway done. 

The image trouble is more along the lines of doing it at 2 in the morning, so I was clicking the don't save button.  And I use photobucket anyway. It never gives me any trouble.

Will: Thanks.

---

IMAGE WORK COMPLETED

[RushHourFreak 1]

Wow I loved this. The last update is a great driver-POV-like one. The highway layout is great and the buildings are incredible, like the street pattern.

Good work.

[Za 164]

Wow, that's pretty neat. I like the mix of maxis and custom buildings

[psander5 195]

The Queensport Harbour Bridge area looks very nice. Pictures of the future for Virgin Shores I wonder? Your intersections look good too. That RHW looks fiddly though! I'll stick to normal roads for now myself! Good job in general.

Edit:  Oops, I rather ignorantly Anglicised your "Queensport Harbor Bridge" title, sorry. 

[lucky7 73]

Very well done, I like the bridge and the shore with all the marinas very much! Very good taste of how to arrange things. Very detailed, looking forward to more,

lucky7

[sedimenjerry 1]

GAHHH

DTP- you need to stop filling up my favorites!

my city may have been larer then your current one but my highways are nothing like this.

[deathtopumpkins 43]

I'm still here folks. Just been working on other stuff.

RushHourFreak: That's what I was going for. Thanks. Glad you like it.

Za: Thanks. I'm trying to build up my plugins folder to the point where I can block all Maxis buildings altogether.

psander5: Definately Virgin Shore's future (this city in fact dethroned the old VSMA as my largest city). RHW takes some work, but I think it's usually worth it. Thanks.

It's fine. I don't even notice stuff ike that. You can tell I'm an American!

lucky7: Thanks a lot! More will hopefully be coming soon.

sedimenjerry: You're telling me to stop filling up your favorites?

I think I got you beat.

[Patricius Maximus 236]

You've got me beat as well.

I see the volleyball picture now. The mistake I made was looking where you had the orange "no pic" label and not reading the signs .

Anyway, I'm looking forward to more of your work.

[sedimenjerry 1]

haha! well, I don't have a sc4 folder

[crazyarchitect 7]

Very nice looking city, love all of the different bridges, so this is what I could look forward to in Virgin Shores, great job

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

Bean Rock Lighthouse!   Yay!

[deathtopumpkins 43]

OK. I finally have time to finish the highways, but first some replies:

Patricius Maximus: It's gotten bigger. This thread wasn't in it yet!

Glad you've seen it now.

More is here.

sedimenjerry: I have to to keep it all organized.

crazyarchitect: Thanks. Definately what you can look forward to in Virgin Shores, though at this rate I think that might be a while.

Craig (abcvs): Hey, thanks for stopping by. Yep. Good old Bean Rock. I thought it looked the most fitting there.

Update now!

Heading away from the A30 interchange eastward of A7, the next exit we come to is for the frontage roads that parallel the freeway on this recently reconstructed part, which is labeled exit 10W.

The 3 express lanes then go elevated, where they remain until exit 10C, which is the only exit while there are frontage roads. This exit isn't that visually appealing, so if anyone has any suggestions, I'd be glad to hear them. Also, the 3-lane freeways have since been repaved with concrete and given proper striping (yellow line on the left).

The highway proceeds in much the same manner for several blocks, until you come to a new roundabout under the freeway where the A505 freeway ends at the A7's frontage roads. The small glimpse of FHW in the lower right corner is the A505 eastbound going down into a tunnel to midtown.

In the top right of the pic, the frontage roads upgrade to full freeway status, and the elevated expressway goes back down to ground level, losing the third lane.

The frontage roads then merge back onto the freeway, at what is labeled exit 10E.

Immediately after exit 10E is exit 9, which serves Water St. and is the main exit for this side of town. Here you can also see the old sound walls from when this was considered the suburbs.

After crossing under Water St., we emerge from a tightly packed grove of skyscrapers onto the Northern Bridge.

This takes us into undeveloped territory, with a newly developed industrial park to our north, which is accessed VIA the B18, at exit 8, a classic diamond.

After proceeding through what seems like the middle of nowhere for a little while, we come to our exit: 9A, which is in the southwest quadrant of a disfigured cloverleaf with the A307, which then plunges into the Eastern Tunnel and back into civilization.

The interesting thing about this cloverleaf is the fact that the town of Brickhaven is built primarily inside the two northern loops.

The Eastern Tunnel is the longest in the city, but the least used (only <1000 cars each rush hour). It's southern portal is in what seems like a small town, but there are some mid-rise buildings up ahead.

Here, the A305, the region's shortest Primary Route, branches off. We'll take it's exit. The A307 loses freeway status shortly after between a convention center/hotel and the Goober Center Shops, then divides and ends at MacKensie St., which, if you recall, parallels the A5.

MacKensie St. ends at A305, but right in front of the Downtown Tunnel, which crosses the river and resurfaces at Water St. in the new Marina. The Downtown Tunnel is the most congested route in the region, serving about 10,000 cars both ways both rush hours. The A305 then merges with A5 just in time to cross the Harbor Bridge, at what is exit 8B for A5 westbound. One thing of note about the A305 is that it is the only road in the region where you drive on the left. This is because of the layout of A5's exit 8, and explains the long loop ramp to get onto A307 northbound.

Concluding our round-trip tour of Queensport, we cross the harbor in the Downtown Tunnel.

Here's a crude diagram showing the tunnel routes:

Next time we'll take a look at some of the other less-known, but still equally important freeways of Queensport: The A505 and A130, as well as the Midtown Tunnel.

[TheSixCents 0]

I really like all of the information. TBH, I think you have alot of potential, and I like all your Road/Freeway Information, even though Im obsessed with public transportation myself

Good luck, and keep it up.

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

I like the brigatine water mod... in fact I think that I would use it myself if I was not so attached to the Auckland one.

[sedimenjerry 1]

OMG

Sheesh, DTP, Patricius Maximus, DTP, Patricius Maximus...

Its like you guys are in a hardcore competition. I can't get over how good y'all are.

[Patricius Maximus 236]

I like the latest tour. Although that highway that drives on the left can be a bit disorienting .

sedimenjerry: Thank you. It's a friendly competition. In the meantime, you can see all the good stuff we're planning .

[Benedict 3,119]

Some nice road geekery, and your city looks beautiful!

[Twenty20 28]

Awesome work with the roads network ! And excellent work too with the urbanisation of the city.

[jacqulina 162]

wow great transport system there my friend,excellent work and pics.

[deathtopumpkins 43]

TheSixCents: Thanks. Roadgeek here. And there'll definately be more.

Craig (abcvs): Well you should stick to the Auckland one as you do kind of play Auckland!  The brigantine one is really good though.

sedimenjerry: As Patricius said, it's a friendly competition. Though we're not really competing for anything, and he's kinda my interchange inspiration.

Patricius Maximus: Thanks. There are warning signs about that!  It was just necessary because the A307 already existed when I built the A305, and I wanted to keep it open during construction as much as possible, considering a thousand people depend on it for their commute.

Benedict: Thanks.

Twenty20: Thanks. It's funny, the city still has farms in parts of it, and then there are miles of suburbs, so I wouldn't exactly call it completely urbaniz(s)ed yet.

jaculina: Thanks.

[Patricius Maximus 236]

That's good that there are warning signs. If I got on that freeway on the left side without warning, I'd be terrified .

Glad that I could be your "interchange inspiration". You've given me a few ideas yourself .

Looking forward to the next update. I like the "highway tour" format.

[deathtopumpkins 43]

Thought it was dead, didn't you?

Never!

Today we'll take a drive down the A130, which is also known as the Midtown Tunnel Connector, as it ends at a tunnel that passes under what was considered, at the time, to be midtown.

From the A30, we take Exit 1, and then pass under an overpass and into a tunnel.

We emerge from the tunnel in what is now considered Midtown, as a ground level highway under several overpasses, approaching Exit 2.

(Prize to whoever knows where I got that street name)

Exit 2 is a little complicated, with a mixture of 1 and 2 lane ramps. This section was rebuilt shortly after taking this picture as part of the A505 realignment project.

After passing under the overpass at the top of the picture, we come to a toll plaza, and spend $1.00 to continue through midtown. The toll plaza itself is kinda behind the SG Eon Center, as it was really hard to get a pic of it.

The onramp at the top is an extra one that is only technically part of Exit 2.

The expressway part of A130 ends here, at an at-grade intersection with Main St. Cars only are allowed to continue into the tunnel.

The tunnel re-emerges right on the waterfront at Marina Ave., just south of a connection to Water St. Water St. is actually now a misnomer, as it never runs along the water anymore. Land reclamation projects have added two blocks of land east of Water St.

The curving tunnel portal to the right is a shortcut to the northern area of the city, and re-emerges at Water St. in a new commercial center a few miles north.

---

If we went south down Main St., and got back on A5, we could then take A505 north through midtown. Remember that T-interchange?

The first exit on A505 is the eastbound exit 2, which was the original terminus of A505, and was built to feed into the tunnel that used to get A505 under midtown. Now. with the demolition of a few smaller buildings, the A505 becomes an elevated highway, and curves to the south to avoid a Stage 14 office building.

After veering to the west a little, the A505 resumes it's northerly course, and squeezes between two apartment buildings.

After passing the apartment buildings, we come to the westbound Exit 2, which straddles the A130, which we pass over interchange-less.

There are onramps for A130 just off of the A505 offramp, though.

The expressway then drops to ground level and navigates an S-curve to regain it's original right-of-way, just before Exit 3 and a tunnel.

The A505 re-emerges just south of that roundabout under the A7, where it ends.

Oops... I just realized I posted that backwards and we were supposed to start at the A7... Oh well... Just ignore the signs being backwards.

---

And I'll close with this pretty picture of my first stage 15 CO$$ building, along the A130.

---

Patricius Maximus: I'm sure it's quite disorienting.

Cool! I have?

New update's here. And next time I think we'll leave Queensport...

[Haljackey 17,254]

Geesh.... This is just some great stuff DTP! I am enjoying every photo! Thus, I am liking this CJ very much!

-Just one question for ya. How do you make those sign photos? Do you use a program or something similar? I have always wanted to know.

Best,

-Haljackey