Starting your own city

[Vincitore 5]

Hello dear SC4 players!

I just started the game after a long break of several years. Now I'm wondering how to begin planning my own town.

I only use the NAM mod and I made a long highway true the center (horizontally and vertically) through the map.

From there I created some high density industry in the upper left corner. In the bottim left corner I created some low dens. commercial area's and in the upper right corner some medium density housing.

Problem is that they have long commute times so how to avoid that? I can't place the industry close to the houses for pollution.

Anyone has a (global) map/idea on how to create a city/region?

[Kifflom112 355]

Maybe reinstall NAM and get you traffic simulator choice in there, and there is another traffic simulator mod that is blue and shows a bridge if you look through it. I have most people traveling from one side of the town to the other side, and they only have short commute. Building realistically is tough if you don't use cheats or plop buildings. I'd recommend cheating. If you don't want to, maybe layout your town first and then build. You should probaly build with only manufacturing industry and maybe plop some buildings down, but you'll have to build fast.

[Vincitore 5]

Ok, I will re-install my NAM mod for the traffic simulator. The traffic simulator controls the amounts of traffic that a road can handle right?

It probably will be a challenge to get enough jobs and short/moderate commute times.

My idea to create 4 zones with the industry/commercial areas to the left zones, and the housing to the right is not bad?

[Kifflom112 355]

Ok, I will re-install my NAM mod for the traffic simulator. The traffic simulator controls the amounts of traffic that a road can handle right?

It probably will be a challenge to get enough jobs and short/moderate commute times.

My idea to create 4 zones with the industry/commercial areas to the left zones, and the housing to the right is not bad?

Yeah, it makes sure a street can handle over 400 cars. And so on. I don't really have industry, but starting off, it is good to have it.

[Vincitore 5]

I created the industry in order to keep the residents at work. The demand for commercial area's isn't that high in my city.

When there is no industry, my people dont have work so it's more like a emergency plan.

I'm currently at work, so I can't make a screenshot of my city

I just started and I only have one city in the region, once I get this city working properly I'll build in the neigbouring town.

/edit: I'm back home and re-installed the NAM Mod and updated the traffic control system.

I'll soon post some pictures of my city

  Edited August 4, 2011 by Vincitore  

[Ltw 401]

Placing the area's on the right place on the map is the key. To give an idea I've posted a screenshot of a city which has separated commercial, residential and industrial area's.

In the photo above you could see an industrial area which is not too far from the residential area's at the left side on the screen and at the right side on the screen. Between these two residential area's are two commercial area's planned. You could see that those area's are well developed because they are close to the residential area's.

You could also see a well developed infrastructure. You could see the EL-trains (which has also a well developed subway system), monorail and rail. Everything is connected with several avenue's. This should shorten the commute time even more.

If you combine those two things you could develop a big city with a short commute time.

Good luck!

[Vincitore 5]

That´s a great city Ltw! I´m jealous of that...

Currently I'm at work, so its difficult to play SC4 but I made a raw sketch in Paint (yeah i know ) about how to plan my city.

The big black lines are my Rural Highways. The green lines are residential, the blue lines commercial and the yellow lines industry.

I wanted to go with medium residential, light commerce and light/medium industry for the beginning.

But I'm wondering, is it smart to have this kind of highway through the middle where the horizontal highway is overpassing the vertical one.

[Ltw 401]

That´s a great city Ltw! I´m jealous of that...

Currently I'm at work, so its difficult to play SC4 but I made a raw sketch in Paint (yeah i know ) about how to plan my city.

The big black lines are my Rural Highways. The green lines are residential, the blue lines commercial and the yellow lines industry.

I wanted to go with medium residential, light commerce and light/medium industry for the beginning.

But I'm wondering, is it smart to have this kind of highway through the middle where the horizontal highway is overpassing the vertical one.

The basic layout of your city is very good! I don't know how big your city will become with this layout but the distances between the different area's seem to be short enough to get a nice development.

Something to consider if you place highways is that the people will move from work to home. So if you want that your sims use those highways it's the best to place them between the different area's so that they're going through the different area's. Placing roads or avenue's at the border of you area's is useful but the experience I have is that those roads will not process a lot of traffic.

In this case most of the traffic will probably go from the right side of the map to the left (from those residential area's at the right side to the commercial area's in the middle) and from the residential area at the left to your industrial area and the commercial area's. If you plan your highways that way that they will get all the traffic of those travel-paterns it would be fine. Another important fact is that sims will take the shortest route to their destination, they probably won't travel (much) larger distances than they have to.

I hope that this will help you.

By the way, if you are having problems you could always PM me.

Ltw

[Vincitore 5]

Something to consider if you place highways is that the people will move from work to home. So if you want that your sims use those highways it's the best to place them between the different area's so that they're going through the different area's. Placing roads or avenue's at the border of you area's is useful but the experience I have is that those roads will not process a lot of traffic.

In this case most of the traffic will probably go from the right side of the map to the left (from those residential area's at the right side to the commercial area's in the middle) and from the residential area at the left to your industrial area and the commercial area's. If you plan your highways that way that they will get all the traffic of those travel-paterns it would be fine. Another important fact is that sims will take the shortest route to their destination, they probably won't travel (much) larger distances than they have to.

This certainly helps me! The idea of placing the zones is fine, and good to hear it.

What I don't understand is:

"So if you want that your sims use those highways it's the best to place them between the different area's so that they're going through the different area's."

So they want to go from the right residentials onto the highway, crossing the map and exit with the industrial zone and wont go to the commercial zones?

It's better to make a avenue through the commercials zones in the middle of the map and reconnect them with the highway?

@MamaLuigi945:

Still thanks for your input I want to create a city with most jobs in the commercial zones. The city wont be that large, more of a medium sized city

  Edited August 5, 2011 by Vincitore  

[The Avatar 1,089]

Hello, I'm a little late to this topic, but I'd like to add some input.

Whe starting a city, there are many different ways to approach it. One way to start off is to create a farming community. It creates a stable economy and provides jobs. Another way is just to create a grid and start zoning. It all depends on what you want to do, and what kind of city you want to create.

[Ltw 401]

To illustrate the idea I've repainted your paint-image. The red stripes are the traffic-patterns that will occur.

You can see that there will be a traffic between the residential area's at the right and the commercial area's and from the residential area to your commercial zones and your industry.

You could place your highways through your residential zones and commercial zones instead of at the borders of those zones. Considering you are planning to use the RHW it is important to think about a good way to build your highways because the rural highway takes a lot of space.

To illustrate this I have another picture of the same city as my post above.

In the picture above you could say a highway which connects the residential zone with the commercial zone. The highway goes through the residential area. This way the sims could leave the highway on the left side and the right side and the traffic will spread out over the whole area. I've solved it the same way in the commercial area's, you see different places where the sims can leave the highway. The result is that there are more possibilities to get from home to work, given the fact that you're sims will choose the shortest route it will result in a spread out travel-patern because every sim has his job somewhere else.

I hope my idea is clear.

  Edited August 5, 2011 by Ltw  

[Vincitore 5]

The idea is very clear to me. I downloaded the RHW mod and I wanted to use those for the low costs to create a highway and $0 maintenance cost.

To use the custom highways is no biggy, and it saves room and easier to lay down the tracks.

I'm gonna create and move the "original" highway a little bit lower. So that I can create a second highway in the upper fields.

[Ltw 401]

The idea is very clear to me. I downloaded the RHW mod and I wanted to use those for the low costs to create a highway and $0 maintenance cost.

To use the custom highways is no biggy, and it saves room and easier to lay down the tracks.

I'm gonna create and move the "original" highway a little bit lower. So that I can create a second highway in the upper fields.

Sounds good.

I would like to see your city when you've build it!

[Vincitore 5]

Today I started to plan and building my city.

Picture 1

Picture 2

Picture 3

Picture 4

I uploaded some pictures to my Photobucket account. The commute times are good for the people that live in the direct surrounding of the highway.

The people that live at the edges of the map border have to travel longer.

he people are using the highway but some intersections are congested, with almost 4000 cars, according to the route information. Is there a way to redirect the highway with an exit ramp that goes straight to the industry or is it better to lay down a road from the residential area through the commercial in the direction of the industrial area?

[jacksunny 741]

I would drag the streets across the avenue to provide a quick access to the commercial. Other ideas include making a bus system, elevated rail connecting the major areas (or subway if the city has the money) and/or making a ring road.

[Ltw 401]

The city looks good. If you wait some time it would develop nicely.

Public transport is indeed a good way to decrease your commute time. You also might make the public transport free (in the money-tab) and the regulation which increases carpooling. I have a big subway-system in my city and those two regulations and the people in my city are traveling the most by foot, than with the subway and than by car.