Griditis & Medium vs. Large Cities

[Jon Ace 0]

I decided to merge my two ideas into one thread.

Firstly, how do I break my Griditis, the urge to use auto-roads all the time and have my city looking like a big grid without any thought to aesthetics or proper traffic planning? I'm looking through some of the city journals here and the planning is amazing. The cities look realistic compared to my blocky creations. Does anybody have any tips?

I remember in Sim City and SC2K, it was a big no-no to plop down roads first. Has this changed in SC4? I've been playing SC4 for a few years off and on, but never really though outside the box on this matter.

Secondly, can you still achieve skyscrapers in a medium-sized city if the surrounding cities are well developed, or are skyscrapers reserved for large cities?

[Lucario Boricua 7,026]

Regarding the griditis, try using regions with rougher terrains--you will see it'll be easier and more fun to lay down non-grid roads. You might also get help if you get the NAM--it has some interchanges for diagonal highway settings, as well as it's programmed to build diagonal streets (you'll benefit from experimenting on a test region). Other options include adopting denditric urban planning (streets for low density are arranged like branches, with cul-de-sacs branching out of collector roads), and adding diagonal main ways (preferrably avenues, highways if you have the money, patience and tools) along the grid areas.

Regarding the skyscrapers issue, their presence is based on RCI statistics--skyscrapers appear when the region overall has more population and jobs, in case your cities have the high density zone areas. They won't grow unless you zone them. This means that--if your region's population is around 200,000 sims (as an example), any city (and this means the small, medium and large plots) with at least 27,000 sims will have at least highrises appear in a while. Have a region with 1,000,000 sims and you'll see skyscrapers pop out on places able to sustain high density (27,000+ for residential, water, enough power, enough civic services and parks if higher wealths are wanted).

Specifically regarding your question, you can achieve the skyscrapers with either a developed city (doesn't have to be large in tile size, but of course it's easier) or with various smaller cities around the region. Still, it's easier to do it with several smaller cities than with a single large one.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

For reasons of running a simulation, the area has to be divided into something. The programmers chose the square grid. It could have been a hexagonal grid and provides more off-grid choices.

You can build roads at any angle that is a multiple of pi/4 (45^o, 50 grads), and holding down shift while dragging roads provides some flexibility. Rough terrain also provides some variety, but the limitations of the program do not allow cattle trails and such which are the origins of most unplanned thoroughfares. The NAM provides some flexibility for streets as well.

There are some buildings with diagonal overhangs on the STEX. If you are a BATter, you can do this yourself. For guidance, go to the modding forums.

[Unassigned 23]

You could look up some not-so-griddy cities eg on Google Earth and find inspiration. Perhaps recreate some city sections (or at least the layouts)? Eg Europe has lots of cities and towns where there is no overall grid...Hamburg, Copenhagen, Amsterdam (special on account of the canals), Wernigerode, Groningen...these are just random examples, there are thousands.

Edit: PS - IIRC Groningen sits on flat terrain, ought to be doable on flat map and a canal addon (you get choice of 2 canal sets with NAM).

[Tysons4 68]

use flood fill (click-hold in one spot and let it auto zone, i think start doing it to the ends of the roads that are there, and then do lots agriculture flood fills at the ends of those streets... fill the whole map, and some windmills, as streets get busy upgrade them. once you have a busy road, zome some commercial... i have never had 2 cities that were alike... they end up looking very real/

round out corners and reduce intersections to streamline the design that comes out.