To work in another City.

[Woundweaver 0]

Ok, i got a nice city going up here but i want to move out the low and middle wealth industry and turn it into more a Commercial/Res high wealth place. To do this i`ve got to clear up a large area of low/medium wealth industry thats just causing me smog and bad enviroment. So I`ve set up a new city that is just pure industry (low and medium) but it`s not actualy a neighbour to the main city. It`s connected by road and train though. All i wanted to know (before i demolish all this industry) was would the people in my main city travel to this industrial city to work or do they just travel to work in a city that is a neighbour ?

[De Ja Vu 117]

You can make a simple test...build two cities with 1 tile in the middle and connect them (1 industrial and 1 residential)....

-Dejavu

[nosyreporter 0]

I was reading a very nice guide on this site. And it said I could build a city in one corner of one map and a neighboring city in an adjacent corner on an adjacent map, and the Sims would drive to work. I have always had pollution problems in my cities and I could not figure out why. So I tried it. The two maps are connected with an avenue and one city is totally residential, commercial and retail and the other is totally industrial, with a couple power plants and things. I have tons of Sims who want to live in my residential city and they are very happy. It's nice to build little suburbs and place churches and coffee shops and things. The industrial city is not doing so well, it is losing money, so I will maybe have to shrink it. But the Sims don't mind driving. I will try a city where they are connected by a highway, then have avenues off that, then filter it down to roads and streets in the neighborhoods and see how that works.

[Dizastrow 4]

I have never had success connecting cities over long distances. Usually what I do is pick a CENTRAL location for my Industry Cities, whether it be one HUGE tile or 4 smaller ones.  That way all the cities around it can be R and C. Then funnel all roads and connections into that one industrial area.  I also centralize my garbage collection.  Works great.

I have tried connecting industrial cities to other cities tiles away but demand is always really low and growth is stagnant.

[Jezus53 18]

I have gotten it to work for up to two tiles. And that's kinda rare for me. For going beteen two cities next to each other, you'll have no problem. If you have a tile between the two, the sims will go there if they have no other choice. Basically, Sims will go where the work is. They won't be happy about the commute time, but they'll do it...at least with Medium and Low Wealth citizens. High wealth sims are arrogant and think they shouldn't have to drive far.

[nosyreporter 0]

Well I tried another experiment, making another residential city next to an industrial city. And the industrial city still ends up losing money hand over fist while the residential city explodes. What am I doing wrong?

[nosyreporter 0]

Doh, a double post. Sorry.

[TheCrybKeeper 300]

Well I tried another experiment, making another residential city next to an industrial city. And the industrial city still ends up losing money hand over fist while the residential city explodes. What am I doing wrong?

Industrial cities make the least profit margin, but adding some commercial to it, can sway the city into the black. Industrial cities make very little cash, when too many transit choices are added. Use only buses for example, or only use trams. All my industrial cities, eventually make profits. The key is in a set pattern. A grid is about the only way to gain profits from industry. Have tried all sorts of travel patterns also.

The very best scenerio is a patchwork region. Checker board your industrial cities, with residential ones. Highly efficient, most efficient for a 2D game.

The checker board stratagy will work for all things SC4. Bus depots should be checker boarded. Fire stations, hospitals, schools and police will end up being a huge 'X' through the city.

[nosyreporter 0]

That is a good strategy. Tonight I will try making an industrial city with two residential ones connecting to it and see how that works. Is it better to use highways or a train network? Last night I tried installing a train network into my residential city and connecting it to an industrial city, and nobody used the train. Did I have it built wrong or was that because the Sims were already using buses and cars frequently?

[veanova 0]

I made a similar experiment the other day, with 3 cities next to each other, connected by a single railroad line. I then put R in one end and I in the other, like this:

[R CITY] ========== [EMPTY CITY w\ RR-LINE] ========== [i CITY]

No luck. The R city had some minor growth, so people were living there, but everyone unemployed or working at the station The I city had no growth whatsoever.

Any thoughts on how to stimulate long distance commuting? I am an architecture student and with my school focusing so much on sustainability and environmentally friendly city planning, I'm kind of obsessed about the possibilities of a rail-based mode of travel for my current region Brainwashed I guess!

(BTW, I use the NAM mod with default settings, as well as the industry quadrupler mod to emulate cleaner industries. Does anyone know of a mod that keeps the same amount of jobs per industrial building, but reduces the pollution level per building to emulate clean air treaties, more efficient technology and stricter emission laws? Thanks!)

[mrbisonm 1,620]

You need to have a certain number of citizens and time of play in your game before sims will use the train-networks. Highways/roads are faster to be used, also are avenues (sims love driving). Later you can add the rails.

Now , I would like to add something about sims living in one tile and working in another. I will explain this later in my CJ thread of 57 regions in details, but let me point out, that sims will live in one tile of the extreme end of a region and work in the tile of the other end of the same region (of course) as long as each two tiles have connections to a neighbor (no matter which one)without all the other tile to being necessarily connected. But they will do so only if there aren't any other citytiles that have been worked on. (oh, and all tiles must be in mayormode to work)

Like I said before, I will explain how that works in my thread one day. I will also talk about the garbage to be only on one tile in your region.

For your neighboring tile that has the industries and loosing money, I recommend that you add some Res to the same industrial citytile until you either get even or actually have a small surplus of income. Don't bother with police, schools, hospitals, parks etc, but make sure that they have water and a firestation in that tile. Usually you only should need something like 20 to 25% Res to be needed by the industries to come to the point of making money, also raise your taxes to 12 or 13% for both Indus and Res.

Once the industrial city is well established, you can concentrate on your neighbor/s and start playing in a more friendly environment with your residentials and commercials. With every 1000 or so population increase, you will have to go back to your industrial citytile and recompensate for the rasing residential population in your other tiles and the demand for jobs ( always making sure that you equal the demand. Make sure that the wealth is the same too, R$ sims cannot work work in a I$$ environment, nor can R$$ sims work at I$..... To balance these two/three or more tiles out evenly , you will have to go back from one tile to another regularily, taking that ion consideration. Not easy, but quite challenging and fun to do.

I have a region with 2.2 Million (12 mediumtile region) that works exactly like this, only one tile has extreme industrial and all other tiles are either residential/commercial or residential/agricultural with only one tile of garbage........and it works.

Good luck

mrb

[veanova 0]

Thank you for an excellent explanation mrbisonm!

"(...)but let me point out, that sims will live in one tile of the extreme end of a region and work in the tile of the other end of the same region (of course) as long as each two tiles have connections to a neighbor (no matter which one)without all the other tile to being necessarily connected."

So in my example, there could be an infinite number of cities between my R and my I city as long as they are of a certain size and connected properly with highways, roads, rail or ferries? Like this:

[R CITY] =====[x number of cities]===== [EMPTY CITY w\ RR-LINE] =====[x number of cities]===== [i CITY]

Or am I missing something here?

Thanks again!

Edit:

A "bonus" question: Does this apply to power as well? Can power be transferred (sold from city to city? How?) from the R city to the I city?

[nosyreporter 0]

Yes the power can be sold between cities. This is what I do ... in my Industrial city, I establish a power plant and leave room for others near the edge (adjacent to the Residential city) so I don't have to spend a lot on power lines. Then you draw some power lines between your plant and the residential city. It will ask if you want a connection to Sim Nation and you say yes. Then eventually it will say that neighbors are clamoring for power deals on the cheap and if you want to initiate a deal. You say yes. Then your residential area has power and your industrial area has power. As each one grows your power demand will grow, then you can add more power plants to the Industrial city and it will flow along the power lines to the residential city. At least that is what I do and it has worked very well. The only time I don't do this is when I am putting down water lines and the pump is out in the boonies. Then I just put a windmill next to it so it has its own power.

[Woundweaver 0]

Well, thanks for all those tips. When i first put the ind city up i made sure i had a rail line going to it from my res/com city. It`s working ok.  Also buses that are doing well to. The only problem i really had was the slow growth for ind in the ind city so i popped in a few medium sized grids of low res in. No police, schools, hospitals just plain old low res. They bloomed really fast and with it the ind demand sky rocketed. The Ind city has about 14 k workers in there now. I then went back to res/com city and expanded that ones res/com. Even thought they were mainly jobless. I then went back to ind city, smashed down all the res and actualy put more ind into it and am now making about 500 a month. Not much but it seemed to give it the boost it needed and established it to look after itself. Res/com city is now over 35k res 8k com, all the others are commuting over to ind city. Also trash deal to ind is working out great and will give ind city a nice boost to it`s coughers. Thanks again for all your tips.

[simpants 0]

Originally posted by: nosyreporter Yes the power can be sold between cities. This is what I do ... in my Industrial city, I establish a power plant and leave room for others near the edge (adjacent to the Residential city) so I don't have to spend a lot on power lines. Then you draw some power lines between your plant and the residential city. It will ask if you want a connection to Sim Nation and you say yes. Then eventually it will say that neighbors are clamoring for power deals on the cheap and if you want to initiate a deal. You say yes. Then your residential area has power and your industrial area has power. As each one grows your power demand will grow, then you can add more power plants to the Industrial city and it will flow along the power lines to the residential city. At least that is what I do and it has worked very well. The only time I don't do this is when I am putting down water lines and the pump is out in the boonies. Then I just put a windmill next to it so it has its own power.quote>

This is how I make money in my industrial cities by selling power and having my neighbors pay for trash. I can keep all of that in one city tile and usually make enough money to stay in the black. If I start getting into the red on money I just add a bit of commercial and/or residential to bring up the money.

[mrbisonm 1,620]

Importing trash and exporting power is a way to make money in your ind citytiles, but as long as the Res city can afford it. I always use a few Res in my industrial tile and aslo bring up the taxes for the industries at about 13% for both manufacturing and hi-tech.

Once I$$ are not needed in my Res city anymore, I will boost the taxes for I$$ higher and lower a bit the I$$$ to a point where I just make enough money to sustain the whole city.

Of course if the Res City can afford exporting trash and pay for energy from the neighbor, then it will be just fine to do so.

Veanova, you are right what you explained with the sims living in one region, but appart, but isn't that what I mentioned above? Both tiles that you have played in and want to be connected have to have connections to a neighbor and all the tiles in between the two do not need any connections to their neighbors and as long as they also do not have any R's, C's or I's. These *in between* tiles need to be empty, or the game will not find a route to the far away neighbor and stop in a closer tile, where sims have already settled........hm....getting complicated here or am I lost.....lol

Anyway, I understood what you meant.

mrb

[Jezus53 18]

Ya know, I don't understand how you guys lose money in the industrial city. I even buy power from a neighboring city for my industrial city and provide a water pump. Hmm.......let me think.......Oh I got it! (I'm not being a smart but, I actually sat here and thought so I thought you should have the full experience ) I put toll booths at all of my neighbor connections. do that and you'll always be in the black. Plus, if you want to keep sims working in a particular city, I found adding those toll booths at city boarders detures them from having a job outside of the region.

[veanova 0]

mrbisonm:

Yes I'm sure you're right, I just want to make sure that I understood it correctly

They *in between* cities have to be empty? That kind of sucks, doesn't it? Say I have one city full of highly educated sims, a second city full of sims with no education and dirty industry and a third with high tech industry, connected like this:

[High EQ city] ----[railroad] ---- [Low EQ/industry city] ----- [railroad] ---- [High tech city]

Are you saying that the highly educated sims will stop and take a job in the middle city instead of commuting to the third city with high tech industry, but that they would go all the way if the middle city had *nothing* but railroad?

Sorry if I'm being slow

Edit: By the way, when I say "cities" I mean lots in region view.

[quikling 0]

you are saying you can have an infinite number of cities between each other and the ecomics of all this will effect each one of them across the board right? i mean power water demand and so on right???

[Jezus53 18]

Originally posted by: veanova

mrbisonm:

Yes I'm sure you're right, I just want to make sure that I understood it correctly

They *in between* cities have to be empty? That kind of sucks, doesn't it? Say I have one city full of highly educated sims, a second city full of sims with no education and dirty industry and a third with high tech industry, connected like this:

[High EQ city] ----[railroad] ---- [Low EQ/industry city] ----- [railroad] ---- [High tech city]

Are you saying that the highly educated sims will stop and take a job in the middle city instead of commuting to the third city with high tech industry, but that they would go all the way if the middle city had *nothing* but railroad?

Sorry if I'm being slow

Edit: By the way, when I say "cities" I mean lots in region view.quote>

Well, Sims don't like long commutes. Think about it in real life. If you had a high level management job at a manufacturing plant which is 30 minutes away, and the same job at a high tech plant but 1 and 30 minutes to 2 hours away, which would you take? Well you would take into account the commute time and the pay. It is obviously better for them to take the job in the closer city and take the pay cut. Saddly, Maxis put that into the game, but neglected to have those sims live within their means so they say they have no jobs. It's dumb. I suggest putting the high tech industry in you're res/com city. This will keep the city clean and keep good jobs close.