Vacant jobs, but no R demand (CAM)

[yigit007 2]

I'm having a problem similar to the one in this thread:

To further explain my problem, it is the residential demand, or lack thereof. Have a population around 10,000 and around 6000 jobs, however I have about 3000 vacant jobs, which mostly consist of I-M, I-HT and various CO. There are no problems of desirability, demand cap, education, commute time, taxes, etc. This is the only city on the region and there's only one connection to a neighboring empty city, so no eternal commuters either.

The last post in the thread I've referred above tells that CAM modifies the workforce ratio that is used in the vanilla (half of the population) so that all of the population is counted as workforce. Is this true? Because Census Repository shows that workforce is still half of the population (and I can't seem to find any info about the ratio of workforce in the readme file of CAM). My RCI graph shows a consistent (and very high) CO$$$ and I-HT demand, but the R demand for all wealth classes is around 0. What's your thoughts about this?

  Edited June 22, 2012 by yigit007  

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

One of the reasons I stopped using CAM is because of anomalies like this. I don't think the census repository senses the presence of the CAM, nor takes it into account. When you mix and match, you have to be very careful. If CAM is present, many of the other mods and plugins will not know that the game has been skewed by the changes, and you will get strange results.

[z1 566]

You appear to have encountered the CAM Demand Bug. It's not that CAM modifies the workforce ratio; it doesn't. It's just that due to the way CAM is constructed, it happens to count all workers twice. This is basically where all the problems with CAM come from. Once this is fixed, if you follow the installation directions for CAM, you shouldn't have any problems. Incompatible add-ons are listed in the directions, and in most cases, they're simply replaced by better functionality in CAM.

I came up with a fix for the CAM Demand Bug a while ago. If you install this file in place of the similarly named file in CAM, the residential doubling bug will disappear, and demand will gradually return to normal.

BTW, be sure not to install any version of the CAM traffic simulator. It's long been superseded by the NAM traffic simulator (which is actually a distant descendant of the CAM traffic simulator).

  Edited June 23, 2012 by z1  

[Essex 322]

Don't use CAM, you can perfectly play it without it, CAM always used to screw up my demand system.

[vortext 573]

If you use the CAM, the main files should be dat-packed with Simcity1.dat in order to avoid the double population count. Otherwise there're two sets of RCI examplers present, hence the population is counted twice which in turn screws up the demand. Here's how it's done. The entire thread might be of interest as it deals with the same issue of not having residential demand.

Also, the CAM is geared towards regional play. It's notoriously hard to develop a single city indeed so my suggestions would be to 1) dat-pack the cam if you haven't already 2) start creating more cities. They don't have to be connected perse but regional demand is key. Finally, make sure to use CAMpatible lots, most on the STEX aren't.

I've been playing with (dat-packed) CAM & CAMpatible lots only for quite a while and never experienced any demand problems what so ever. My current region is about the same size (13k) but in the past I've had regional populations well over a million. Hope you'll get things going again.

  Edited June 23, 2012 by vortext  

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

I guess it really depends on how badly you want CAM. Once you have manipulated the game files, you had better have two things:

1. a backup of the original files

2. a copy of the modified files (probably a backup of Program Files ...\Maxis)

So many people don't take out any insurance. You hear them crying later. Everyone should backup their <user>\Documents\SimCity 4 structure weekly at least.

Which reminded me to check my weekly backup (its automatic) and I found that I had left out my Downloads folder.

  Edited June 23, 2012 by A Nonny Moose  

[vortext 573]

Everyone should backup their <user>\Documents\SimCity 4 structure weekly at least.

Couldn't agree more, everyone should back the f*ck up!!

Seriously though, it's just good practice which will prove itself invaluable in the long run, especially when doing custom lotting or modding of any kind.

[yigit007 2]

Phew, nice to learn this before my city grows Applied datpacking and now workforce is how it's supposed to be. Thanks everybody.