A few tips, please

[panteruka86 0]

Hello, I'm back to play sim city... but i seem to be having the same old problems. I really dont know how to organize the city. Should i put all the industry in one side, and residential & commerce areas in another? My commerce demmand is low, and they only demand polluting and farms industry, which lead to nothing good as the farms are only 2 workers... I dont really like growing farms, plus all the pollution they bring. The traffic is driving me mad: if i build streets to not have so many jams, they complain they dont have streets. If i build streets, they complain about the traffic... And my public transport dont seem to be working at all, I dont know if I'm placing them out of the routes, or what. No matter how many bus stops i make or parking places, they don't use them at all.

What size do you suggest for zones? Ive tried 6x6 and 6x12 but its very tiring to build, as it keeps building streets in between, and im not sure if I should or not.

Thanks

[2557+cards 0]

Normally, I begin with zoning a small amount of residential next to a small amount of industry, with maybe a block of commercial.

As the city grows, expand the industrial away from the residential, and expand the residential away from the industrial. Slowly expand the commericial area along an artierial road.

Once you begin recieving commerical demand, begin building a CBD (central business district), which will be composed of medium-or-high density commericial, with one or two blocks of high density residential. The industrial area should still be expanding away from the residential and commericial areas. The residential area should be surrounding the CBD, but with commericial zoning along an artierial road(s). Preferably, when development calls for it, have a highway running through the CBD.

If you wish to create realistic cities, outside of your CBD, only zone medium residential along arterial roads, except in a few cases. Otherwise only zone low-density residential.

The residential can be expanded away from the industry in more than one direction; however, keep your original housing near the industry.

***

As for zone sizes, I recommend starting with approximately five blocks of 4x4 residential zones, and then expanding as necessary. For industry, approximately 4 blocks of 5x5 or 6x6. In the beginning, only zone commercial around your artierial road; once a CBD develops, zone in 4x4 to 5x6 or 6x6 block sizes to allow for skyscrapers later in development.

***

After building this city to a good size (about 10,000 inhabitants), being creating neighbor cities with mostly residential and low-density commercial. However, remember to constantly come back to your main city to zone more RCI (residential, commericial, industrial) to support the neighbor cities: people will commute both in and out of your major city.

Have fun playing SimCity 4.

[Halen Of Dania 350]

let me tell u it isnt your fault . SC4 was layed out terribly , the designers for one made it so that u have to build transportation systems to succed (etc . buses , rail )

second of all we and the communties where forst to make mods cause the game infrastruture making was so terrible and repetive that it was disgusting .

thirdly may mention some of my teqniques.

i ussaly zone med commerical and resedential so one thing isn't all in one place. I also plop shoping centers like huge ones where the free space is .

few really do this but they boost your housing demand by tonnes each month . also make sure u provide maxed out funding for health care . FUND AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE don't be owrried if u go in the red for a little bit because u will come out if u provide proper taxes and the right amount of services .

A chart here

resedential : requires big commerical for big demand (etc . medium and high rise zoning )

commerical: requires commerical and industrial (commerical : low medium or high , industrial medium )

industrial: requires resedential , water for high tech industry ( : medium , high= (only for industrial cities)

i hope this was helpful and take some notes if u have too

halenbyname

[quicksilver991 37]

SC4 wasn't really laid out terribly. In fact, most communities have some sort of mass transit, so the decision to require transit options wasn't really a bad one. You hardly ever see major cities without at least a bus system. Yes, the buildings can get repetitive, but that is the limitations of the game that really can't be avoided. It simply isn't possible to have an infinite number of buildings in the game's building database.

[Comrade Kc 7]

Well to start i recommend getting the "Colossal Add-on Mod" aka. CAM. It fixes allot of the traffic problems and makes roads and travel more realistic and not like everybody has a Model-T, you can use streets like real city's use them, the game dose not really like streets, before i got CAM i never even build them except out to the dump.

But for zones i can recommend a few things.

for houses i have 5 techniques i use all mixed up.

1) in the outskirt i zone 3 1x3 next to each other randomly mainly on back-roads i create.

this allows for divers living space for my sim, and also for a high wealth house to build in the woods witch looks cool. (33 of these 3x3 boxes will give you 500 population, with should allow you to afford a fire station, that will bring up the mayor rating and you get your house, makes a nice founding settlement

2) i put a row of 2x2 houses next to any industry or commercial i build, i stretch it till a street pops up then back up 1 space so i don't have a street.

This can vary for some reason but for the most part it resembles the row of houses you may see driving into a town.

3) i make subdivisions with a culdesac at the ends of them branched out off a main road. i make them the same way, i drag a 1x2 res out on a dead end road i put of the main road till i get a street, but instead of backing up 1 space and laying it down,i hold shift and make them 1x3 (holding shift allows for a long line of houses without streets popping up)

4) i make blocks of 6x6 that i can turn into apartments but not to many of these and usually in a corner i put high dens office or industry

5) i make small 2x2, two 2x5 block (randomly for effect) and just put 1x1 houses all around it and inside. i use this for corner-store towns or starter villages. you can just delete the road between them and merge the blocks together very easy in the future, and that is what most city's do over time anyway.

industry and commercial i put next to each other right in the middle of where the city center is, and every small town has a 2x2 or 3x3 med ind next to the commercial for diversity. (i just act like my sims can all grow there own food so i don't even bother with farms.

industry i have grow one way and commercial I have go another way. over time i split them up with parks down the middle and if its next to watter i put docks in between the C and I meet at the water.

I put housing everywhere, next to factory's and businesses but i got to have my ghettos next to my factory lol

also i try to put roads around the densest forests and put a sight in if ans say its a park, and try to build my city's at first where there are no trees.

well these are just some of millions of things you can do in SC, but i hope i helped with what you were asking,

  Edited March 8, 2011 by Comrade Kc  

[z1 566]

Well to start i recommend getting the "Colossal Add-on Mod" aka. CAM. It fixes allot of the traffic problems and makes roads and travel more realistic and not like everybody has a Model-T, you can use streets like real city's use them, the game dose not really like streets, before i got CAM i never even build them except out to the dump.

Although the CAM is a great add-on (I use it in all my cities), it doesn't do anything directly with traffic. It does have an optional traffic simulator, but it's many years old and quite obsolete, and even the CAM builders don't recommend using that traffic simulator. Instead, they use the current NAM traffic simulator, which comes with the NAM, and which I would recommend as well. (Somewhat interesting historical note: The CAM traffic simulator is actually the great-granddaddy of the current NAM traffic simulator.)

[Comrade Kc 7]

really? i downloaded NAM and i did not like all the puzzle pieces, i kept the turn lanes but that still left alot of Pieces that i dont need.

then i downloaded a traffic simulator for NAM that was supposed to allow me to just change up the traffic laws to how i wanted, but it never worked.

would you happed to have a link to the most updated realistic traffic fix please

it would be much appreciated.

i like the cam because it increased the capacity so much and allowed my Sims to ride bikes so pedestrians almost trail accost a med map.

i like how the cam allows low res to work in med and high res jobs as well.

[panteruka86 0]

Thank you all for your help, I will try what you've said and i will have a look at that CAM thing.

[panteruka86 0]

How do i uninstall it and completely remove it from the game? I have changed my mind, and after seeing the stuff and taht it looks odd in english, with my game settings in another language... I dont wanna use it. Plus, after installing it i have suffer a massive unemployment crisis.