Help needed with zoning, as well as questions about transitioning to high-tech from dirty industry.

[Spearhead44 11]

Hey Simtropolis. Second post here. After messing with my other big city I decided to start a new one. This time I've pretty much nailed the layout of it, however constructive criticism is always welcome seeing as many of you have been playing this for a lot longer than I have. Any advice is appreciated!

I posted a question here a couple of weeks back about the right layout for streets/avenues and I've found one that seems to work pretty well. I've got about 70,000 residents on a large map and about half commercial and half industrial. All low density at this point, I have learned from past experience it is easier for me to "build out" before I start messing around with skyscrapers. I've divided every usable piece of land on the map (besides the river) into 5 by 5 squares, with interchanging avenues and two lane "access roads". I basically started off with residential and a large dirty/manufacture industry sector. As I expanded, I began to add commercial property and high tech industries only in areas that needed jobs. The result is that I've finally built out the entire city, but the vast majority of commercial areas have low customers. I figured that was okay for the time being, as long as they're providing jobs for the area, as well as being conveniently located by the clusters of high tech industry. Also, avg income is around 70 k.

Now to my question. I've reached the point where I need to begin zoning for medium and high density properties, but am kind of unsure as to how to go about this. Should I place the medium residential zones in the center of the map, where I'd prefer to have my "downtown" and commercial areas in the future? Or should I zone closest to the industrial area, a little closer to the edge? Furthermore, will my choice of street layout screw up everything because of too many intersections? Should I zone medium residential or commercial first? How many medium zones should I have before I begin high density?

And the question of high tech. I know from past experiences taxing the heck out of dirty/manufacturing industry and then replacing it with high tech is a good way to clean the city up. Should I place the dirty industry outside the borders of the map in the other cities in the region? Should I do this before or after I begin zoning for medium and high density residential?

Thx

[iAhhnuld 0]

Hey there!

I'm not an expert at this game, but it looks like you & I are on the same page; except the fact that I used agriculture to begin my economy with rather than dirty industry. I too am planning on trying to convert my first city from a farmtown to a commercial city by simply transforming my farms into residential areas and replaces the existing residential areas into commercial areas.

For placing the downtown question, I suggest you put it in the center. I don't exactly have an explanation other than the fact that it's my personal preference and it's more realistic in my point of view. As for the street layout, I don't really know what your layout is like, BUT I do know that commercial zones love traffic because it brings in more customers and more money for them and the city. I've seen this happen firsthand on my previous first cities and I thought it was pretty cool. Another thing, don't worry about trying to build high density commercial zones right away. Honestly, for me at least, start putting them in once you feel that you're region has enough population to bring in workers to those high-rise buildings. If they don't, then chances are they are going be abandoned and look all crummy on your city skyline. Lastly, for the question of high tech, what I did was taxing the heck out of agriculture and dirty industry in my downtown. However, I didn't tax the manufacturing industry just because I felt that my low & medium wealth residents still needed them for jobs.

That's all I have to say for your questions. Keep in mind, what I just said are all suggestions and not a way of forcing you to do all the things I suggested. It's you're city & region, and go have fun with it! Hope I helped!

P.S: If you want more guidance, I'm following this city/region-building method called "Natural Growth" posted in the link here: https://www.sc4devotion.com/forums/index.php?topic=9440.0

Good luck & have fun!

[jason leo 485]

Now to my question. I've reached the point where I need to begin zoning for medium and high density properties, but am kind of unsure as to how to go about this. Should I place the medium residential zones in the center of the map, where I'd prefer to have my "downtown" and commercial areas in the future? Or should I zone closest to the industrial area, a little closer to the edge?

Basically, make sure if the distance between their working places (C or I) and their homes is not too far, if the distance is too far away from the working place, then abandonment will strike and bad things can be happened in your city.

Furthermore, will my choice of street layout screw up everything because of too many intersections?

Supposedly, not, if your city is well-managed. Make sure if you have NAM so traffic problems will not easily happened. Adding a lot of mass transit system to overcome higher population is not a bad idea too.

Should I zone medium residential or commercial first?

I suggest you to zone both of them at the same time, it will make them grow at the same time too, make a balance between the number of the population and the number of workers around your city.

How many medium zones should I have before I begin high density?

The first thing you must do is make sure if your city is matured enough, otherwise, too many R$ might become a problem and a deadly trap for your city. Usually, a well-facilitated city with most of it's population is R$$ is matured, and usually, hi-rises will grow when the population is around 40,000-50,000, high enough demand of R, and matured.

And the question of high tech. I know from past experiences taxing the heck out of dirty/manufacturing industry and then replacing it with high tech is a good way to clean the city up. Should I place the dirty industry outside the borders of the map in the other cities in the region?

Place them in a neighboring city is better, because the pollution will not transferred from one city to another, and other cities around it will not affected. But, doing so will rather useless if you don't have any demand for I-D. And a matured city usually has a low or negative demand for I-D, so most likely, it will be useless to zone some areas for them. However, it is based on your city's demand graphic, no need to zone for something that not needed.

Should I do this before or after I begin zoning for medium and high density residential?

If you have high R$ demand, then I suggest you to do that after the residential buildings grow. Btw, if the I-D demand is high, then I suggest you to zone the I-D areas first, but if you don't have any/low demand for both R$ and I-D, then I suggest you to not zone them. And as I said above, usually, matured city no longer need I-D, so there is no need of zoning them.

[Cefien 361]

Now to my question. I've reached the point where I need to begin zoning for medium and high density properties, but am kind of unsure as to how to go about this. Should I place the medium residential zones in the center of the map, where I'd prefer to have my "downtown" and commercial areas in the future? Or should I zone closest to the industrial area, a little closer to the edge? Furthermore, will my choice of street layout screw up everything because of too many intersections? Should I zone medium residential or commercial first? How many medium zones should I have before I begin high density?

Well, i don't see this as a problem, it's only a matter of decision. I'll let someone else suggest their opinions of where is the right place to do the zoning, for i don't really care about that, since again it is just a matter of decision to me. I'm not the one who'll play the city here, but you are, so....what matters to me is the transportation you provided and the education level your citizens have, cause that will be the essential determination of where your citizens will take their jobs. Concerning the transportation, this is only a little remainder, for not all simcity player realize this, here it is; your citizens/residents no matter wealth level they are will always take the fastest way to go to their workplace, they don't care how much you give them mass transits like buses, trains, monorails, etc. if they could find the job faster without taking those mass transits, they'll ignored them. So, you better pay a very good attention to you mass transit and roads connection of course. Now, concerning education, it's actually quite simple, and it goes like this; the more educated your citizens/residents, the higher level of jobs they need. For example, educated citizens will want to take job at I-M instead of ID or CO$$$ instead of CS$. So, you must pay attention to your education level too, before do the zoning. If you don't wanna end up with abandonment issues, or a long commute times, you better pay attentions to these two factors.

And the question of high tech. I know from past experiences taxing the heck out of dirty/manufacturing industry and then replacing it with high tech is a good way to clean the city up. Should I place the dirty industry outside the borders of the map in the other cities in the region? Should I do this before or after I begin zoning for medium and high density residential?

Again, i dont really care about the zoning. Remember i told you about the education level? Beware of your intention of cleaning the city that might lead you to another problems. If your citizen is not ready for I-HT, don't even think of replacing the dirty industry within your city. I-HT will need high educated citizens. Be sure your education is enough before thinking of replacement.

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Sometimes these "Should I... ?" questions sound as if any deviation from recommendations was a punishable offense, or as if you had only one attempt to build one city. Ever.

Why don't you just try and see what happens? There is no better way to learn, and you cannot break anything. In the worst case, you simply don't save the city and try something else next time.

SC4 is actually VERY forgiving in terms of zone development, you only need to watch your budget. You can always bulldoze and rebuild whatever you don't like. You can even take that as an additional challenge that will aid long-term motivation. Real cities face similar problems: Those residential blocks, back then gold standard, are no longer up to snuff and need to be replaced. The old ring road is congested and will need to be replaced. The once-idyllic harbour quarter looks run-down and out of place, so it gets demolished and will be replaced by shiny skyscrapers. Old factories don't attract workers any more, and besides the city has grown around them. Here comes the wrecking ball, and next there will be new residential areas.

There is no need to tax anything out, either. Time and education will make I-D demand vanish all on their own.

A more important technique is using the Route Query tool. How so? Well, you clearly see on your screen where residential and commercial buildings grow well, there's no need for any voodoo. However, one thing you don't see is whether commercial and industrial areas are actually used and contribute something to your city - something other than consuming space, causing infrastructure costs, and emitting pollution, that is. With the Route Query tool. you can check one very important thing: "Does anyone atually travel there to work?". If no commuters go there even after the building has been standing there for a few months/years, the building is useless - it just takes demand away, but doesn't employ a single Sim. This can happen when the jobs don't match the job requirements of nearby residents, or when the commute is too long for those workers that match the job qualification - a sign that you'll need to do something like offering better public transportation etc. to get your Sims occupied.

The rest is a mixture of patience, experimenting, and common sense. Oh, and of personal taste, of course.

[Cefien 361]

Amen to that.

I, myself, like to try first before asking questions....sometimes....

Still, people have their own consideration. Right here, it's only a matter of suggestions, they can either listen or not.

There are two types people out there, those who like to ask first before doing something, and those who like to do something before asking questions. And you can't simply tell which one is better.

In the case of learning process, asking questions is essential and then after that it will be followed by experiments. Even in experiment questions will still emerge. And again you can't simply separate them.

In the end, it's all up to those who are learning, whether they wanna ask questions or not. And then we can only suggest, cause it's only a matter of suggestion here.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

The last two posters definitely have the right track. Ask your computer! Just make a separate backup copy of your region, and try a few things. If you don't like what you've got, restore the backup.

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Well, I hope I didn't sound as if I wanted to discourage asking questions or as if I thought it was generally a bad thing to ask. My intention is rather to encourage people to try stuff out because sometimes the questions sound to me as if the poster was a bit timid and afraid to mess something up irrevocably. In short, I don't mean to say "Don't ask, don't get on our nerves", but rather "Don't be shy, you can't get hurt".

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Well, I hope I didn't sound as if I wanted to discourage asking questions or as if I thought it was generally a bad thing to ask. My intention is rather to encourage people to try stuff out because sometimes the questions sound to me as if the poster was a bit timid and afraid to mess something up irrevocably. In short, I don't mean to say "Don't ask, don't get on our nerves", but rather "Don't be shy, you can't get hurt".

I think both of us were trying to say politely that it never does any harm to try something out as long as you have a backup. Answers are got a lot quicker from the computer than from the forums which not everyone visits every day.

Let me say again: The only dumb question is the one that doesn't find a voice.

By all means ask, but also try to be more self-reliant. It isn't good to be running home to mommy on every little issue. It doesn't do anything for your own self-esteem. Solving your own problem is an advance and it usually makes you feel rather good, too.

[arozarker12 51]

I like to try and experiment! I will ask if I get really stuck but I can always nuke my city if it makes me to aggravated! LOL!

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Well remember not to delete it. Deleting the city takes out the terrain. Use the Obliterate function (god menu).

[Cefien 361]

Well, i apologize Mr.Spearhead44, before you got confused with our never-ending argument. I'll give you the keyword here.

"Backup"

Everything is possible in SimCity because of this word. Don't be afraid of making mistakes as long as you keep this.

But please don't stop asking questions, cause "we don't pretend we have all the answers. But the questions are certainly worth thinking about."

Though we're not here everyday like Mr.Moose said, but isn't it what the forum intention guys?? A place to ask and to answer questions?? If not, i better step off before i hurt anybody.

Don’t stop asking so many questions, and if you have kids at home, don’t stop them either! (Chris Widener)

[Spearhead44 11]

Thanks for the well written posts, wasn't available to reply yesterday as my friend was in the ER for 6 hours.

This is the third or fourth "mega region" I've done. I think my largest city was 2 million. So I'm not totally inexperienced, I just wanted to clarify specifically what was going on. I am just slightly insecure, because my last region was doing pretty good however in the process I made some reckless design decisions that came back to haunt me later. This one has the potential to be the best city I've ever made, so I'm just double checking, lol.

Speaking of education, crime, health, etc... I am pretty good on those. I've got plenty of k-12 schools, 1 university and a main library. Some of them have a thousand students, some of the have under 100. I'm guessing high wealth residents have very few kids, whereas low wealth has many? Because for many areas with lots of people there are hardly any kids going to elementary school.

Also, does anyone know why one of my hospitals keeps going on strike when I have more doctors than patients?

Thx for the tips...

[jason leo 485]

Also, does anyone know why one of my hospitals keeps going on strike when I have more doctors than patients?

Are you sure if the problem is more doctors than patients ? And have you check the capacity and the used capacity ? If the number of doctors in that hospital is more than the number of the patients but the capacity of the hospital is less than the patients, then a strike can be happened. Btw, I must confirm it because I'm not sure if there is any hospital that so ineffective.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

On school enrolment: Take a look at the Population by Age display. The bluer the area, the older the residents, and the kids have grown up, so fewer school slots are needed. Generally more blue, more museums, libraries, art galleries, etc.

You can use the budget panel to control the available slots in the education system per building by adjusting the sliders. Well worth review every few Sim-years as things move along.