Show us your Small Towns

[Chesh 173]

Lewis; 14,000 people

 

 

[tonyr 926]

Beautiful work my friend!

[Mymyjp 1,052]

beautiful indeed!

[Compdude787 916]

Wow, Chesh, that looks really nice! I love the mountain towering over this town! I also like how you effectively combined the Maxis seaport with those seawalls so that the seaport didn't look so lonely. I also love how your street layout follows the coastline so well.

 

Ronald Reagan officially approves!

[mrsmartman 200]

The coastal area of many maps are quite steep, which makes coastal development difficult.

PEG coastal terraforming tool is useful for producing flat land without affecting the coastline. It takes time, though, to produce perfect flat foundation for development.

[Chesh 173]

Thanks! I created a new town today named Larsson, bumping the region population to 25k

 

 

Meanwhile, on the other side of the planet exists a small town (coincidentally) named Larsson. I love the transition between RCI types here

[SteveMSim 275]

Good work, Chesh.  Just one comment.  You may want to turn the grid off before taking a screenshot.  You press "g" on your keyboard to do so.

 

Now presenting the latest town from my latest region, a town named Richland Lakes:

 

 

The town's location by the edge of the city tile is due partially to being next to an already existing city, Twin Lakes, which I developed in the middle of its city tile.  This town is the first of at least two "villages" I plan to develop on this particular tile.

 

A closer view of the town, showing its business district:

 

 

Another closeup view, a neighborhood, Shackelford Hill, named for the hill it's built on, which the hill itself is named after the mansion atop it, in the upper right corner:

 

 

Up the railroad line from the town is a small crossroads with a few residences and businesses that serve the nearby farms.  This, however, is not the second "village" I mentioned earlier.

 

[MushyMushy 3,618]

Looks good Steve!

 

A few things though... I'd highly recommend downloading the 3 different mods that remove the neighbor connection arrows, the yellow pause thingy, and the little minimize button. It really helps!

[SylvioJ 388]

Just a tiny, unnamed town with a water airport I've just built.

 

 

 

[Thin White Duke 4,072]

Hudson, Maricopa. Still a work in progress.

 

[SAVAGExPHOENIX 955]

I'm doing a non-story related entry for the Illium Kingdom City Journal, showing the growth of the small town of Navarro. Here are the "before" pictures. 

Overview, showing the the town, the interchange for IH-30 and PH-1499. This is about 185km West of New Dallas, in the southern flat plains of the Kingom.
(click for larger view)

 

 

Here's a closer shot of the town of Navarro itself. In June of 1996, the population was 417 (425 including the 8 non-resident college students). The town was established in 1903 by Jeoffrey Navarro at the intersection of two of the main roads in the area (Now PH-1499 and PH-380 (PH=Provincial Highway)). 



I'll probably post the "after" pictures after the CJ update is complete.

[timmie 988]

I especially like that interchange, nice!

[SAVAGExPHOENIX 955]

Here's an "after picture", halfway through the update. See more of how Navarro got to this point in my CJ

(click for larger view)

[Breki 6]

Lewis; 14,000 people

 

 

 

 

Beatifully realistic!

 

Just a tiny, unnamed town with a water airport I've just built.

 

 

 

This too! Regarding the airport, is it functional? And I believe this is ploppable water?

[SylvioJ 388]

 

Just a tiny, unnamed town with a water airport I've just built.

This too! Regarding the airport, is it functional? And I believe this is ploppable water?

 

 

Thanks! No, it isn't, but they have jobs.  yes, it is ploppable water.

[rubberduck3y6 45]

Thanks! I created a new town today named Larsson, bumping the region population to 25k

 

 

 

 

Meanwhile, on the other side of the planet exists a small town (coincidentally) named Larsson. I love the transition between RCI types here

 

 

Nice work! What cliff mod is that?

[Ace3 1,209]

Imageshack is force removing my photos one by one overtime so here's an old work that will soon disappear ;(

 

[Thin White Duke 4,072]

Imageshack is force removing my photos one by one overtime so here's an old work that will soon disappear ;(

 

<snip>

 

Oh no! You need imgur! D:

 

Also, nice work.

[tonyr 926]

Beautiful small towns here guys!

[BLANKBLANK 4,414]

Loving the small towns, I guess over the years it has become easier to create them and far more easier to diversify them what with the ever increasing amount of plugins available.

[JP Schriefer 5,591]

Imageshack is force removing my photos one by one overtime so here's an old work that will soon disappear ;(

 

 

 

Nice picture you did!

It's just weird have a feeling about a website, but imageshack just make me want to murder the goofy there who gave the order to just disappear with millions of images which millions of people used. They should at least let the images that were there, anyway...imgur is great, I hope it don't follow imageshack idiot idea.

[vortext 573]

The reason I really, really like Girafe's Oak trees: they´re big enough that when you plop them tight next to the street they'll overhang without any trunks on the pavement, creating forest covered streets.  Some goes for the Norway Maples. 

 

click for full size

 

 

 

And some MMP-ing to dress things up a bit. I bulldozed the inner tile of the 45 curve to get MMPs partially on the street surface while the curve itself remains intact. Also, spot the strategically plopped birches to cover an AC unit.   

 

click for full size

[Mymyjp 1,052]

as always vortext, amazing work. Those buildings are stunning, with the little farms...and how beautiful that road is..

[9gruntsand1hammer 3,198]

.This is the town of Haybale. It's the only landlocked town on Sugar Island and is home to commuters who work in either Garden River, Cambrian, or Sault Ste. Marie.

 

The towns population is 4,900.

 

Downtown Haybale.

 

This is the Town of Hagia. It's located on the southeastern end of Sugar Island. Commuters drive to Drummond which is the big high-tech sector on the island, take the ferry to Aberdeen or Garden River, or take the Monorail to Garden River or Sault Ste. Marie. The population of Hagia is 8,864.

 

Downtown Hagia.

[9gruntsand1hammer 3,198]

Downtown Muriel with a population of 9,855.

 

Aberdeen ferry terminal and commercial district. This ferry connects the mainland to Sugar Island and the Town of Drummond.

 

Downtown Drummond with a population of 15,640.

 

 

The main area of Sugar Village with a population of 5,780.

[xone lifeless 4]

Woah, it's been a long long time since I touch this game   Rusty hand is really rusty. Start with a small town first, as usual.

Slightly larger pic: http://i.minus.com/ibgUbB98UEXaNm.jpg

 

[cardiomonkey 32]

This is my first attempt at a small, rural town, roughly 3 500 sims.

There is a lot to learn even when making small towns. 

 

I seem to have trouble with creativity 

[Chesh 173]

This is my first attempt at a small, rural town, roughly 3 500 sims.

There is a lot to learn even when making small towns. 

 

I seem to have trouble with creativity  

 

 

it looks good! some advice - diagonal (and fractional) streets and roads (especially along I-AG, where zoning on diagonal is easy) will greatly improve the look of your developed areas. add smooth curves and even the drabbest town scrubs up pretty nice

[T Wrecks 10,210]

Yeah, well... the problem is also the perfectly flat map here. Some terrain features make it a lot easier to incorporate road layouts that break the grid. However, in our industrialised world you'd naturally strive to keep farm fields as strictly rectangular as possible, and as we can see e.g. in the mid-west U.S., there's a tendency to keep things griddy when there's lot of space and no interrupting terrain features.

 

What you could do is center the main development around a road intersection, or alongside a main road. Normally a town would not have developed out in the (roadless) boonies. There's also a rather abrupt change from mid-rise residential to farm fields, and those two commercial buildings out in the fields would look better next to a main road IMO.

 

Another general hint I can give you is "mind the gap", meaning that it's not bad to leave part of the city tile undeveloped. I also have a tendency to use every inch of land, but some nature inbetween really adds some spice. Even if it's just some woodland or shrubbery between the last house and the first farm field. Some MMP footpaths through the forest or between forest and field can also work well - and maybe there's a rich guy in town who has a mansion set inside a little forest in the outskirts of the village? Or there could be a small school/sports complex somewhere... then again, you could also create something realistic by going all out boring and making just a few large rectangular fields and one or two main roads... add a tree line along one of the main roads, and you have a realistic piece of rural boredom and monotony.

[cardiomonkey 32]

Thanks Chesh and TWrecks for your tips and pointers.

 

I am going to have a go at another small town tomorrow and hopefully will be an improvement. I agree with the two commercial buildings being so out of place. They were almost the last developments I made and was just excited that they grew, haha.

 

I have some great farmlands around me here in Sweden, but I have also seen some great stuff in the Texan plains and in Australia. Rural could be done in so many ways I guess.

 

Thanks again for the tips and I am eager to give it another go now :-)

Will have to post again soon