landmark - ploppable - growth tactic

[sachizm 65]

I have not played this game in 4-5 years, I never knew custom content was available so I'm spending a few months getting used to all the new toys. I'd like some feedback if the following strategy of shaping my down town areas will work. I am using the mod and blocking all maxis content and downloading all custom, overly modern content, much of it Hong Kong and Dubai stuff.
So

If after building my population by working inwards from outer suburbia (which will still be quite built up) I get to where I want to build me central downtown area;

Commercial-
create my downtown area by putting down my main large buildings as landmarks with 1-2 as ploppable with jobs. Then as I build my residential area and demand for more commercial goes up I change my landmark buildings into ploppable.

Residential-
The key res buildings I wish to use, especially along my waterfronts are mostly from HK and have very large footprints. If I put down the ploppable version on pause and build the surrounding infrastructure, where possible making the only direct street frontage on one side (putting a ring of small parks on other). Then bulldozing the ploppable and zoning  using control + zoning to make it the right size. Making sure there is a huge amount of school, health and other infrastructure on site before I un-pause to make sure I draw the right demogrphic from the start.

Besides my main show piece buildings which will be hiuge I will have regular res and com zoned to build up around it.

Can any one see any flaws in this proposed strategy?
 

[mattamillion 2]

The only thing I've found is that even if you plop LM's with jobs it won't necessarily drive all of the development. You still need good schools, parks, etc., to encourge all of that.

I find that in my downtowns you need to drive traffic through them in order to really create the high demand for CO or CS. Putting residential on one side and jobs (industry) on the other will drive people through the area and that will help your demand. Plopping LM's with jobs will help make it a destination for workers and drive traffic but it's really about traffic (I've found) to drive the big buildings.

[zurrabear 20]

I could be wrong, but I thought that plopped residential buildings (as opposed to landmarks that merely appear residential) would always fail and be abandoned by the game at some point.  I'm not sure if the reason for this is known. So while your idea for spurring commercial growth should work, I don't think doing the same with ploppable Res will work.  For those you need to zone the space to uniquely suit specific buildings you want to appear, and create the demand for the building, considering whether it's high or medium or low wealth.  If you lack demand in that category, it's not going to appear.

Demand is key, overall, along with creating favorable conditions for the wealth category you need.  Good education, health and low pollution are important.

[heitomat 156]

Originally posted by: zurrabear

I could be wrong, but I thought that plopped residential buildings (as opposed to landmarks that merely appear residential) would always fail and be abandoned by the game at some point.
quote>

Residential ploppables have to be plopped on developed, residential zones to avoid abandonment. I think.. 

[sachizm 65]

Maybe I didnt explain it properly. Ive read the various posts on here and saw the issue with plopping res's. I meant I'd plop the building there just to landscape around it, put in all the schools and infrastructure. Then bulldoze the res building and place a zome of exact size (with only one street frontage so it grows in the right direction).

With commercial I'd put the landmarks down which give it a small incentive for commercial, of course all the other aspects will be pre developed. As the demand for commercial goes up I just bulldoze one landmark at a time and replace it with the ploppable version of the same building that inccurs jobs.

[SC4BOY 20]

That method would work fine if that's what you wish to do.. whether the building you've landscaped for would grow in that spot is quite another issue however