Increase Co§§§

[frostback 0]

I was trying to build a large city in SC4 deluxe and used neighbour city's for industrial demand etc.

I just can't seem to get a real good demand on §§ and §§§ business, and therefor it won't expand. I've read quite some things about it, like changing tax rates etc. But I can't seem to get it in my city.

Could some1 have a look at my region and give me some tips?:

 

http://www.sendspace.com/file/swdtxt

You can check the link for a virus. Should be clean.

 

Print screens:

Region

Capital city

ps. please don't reply with a mod or something, unless SC4 is really bugged (Didn't read that anywhere so I assume it isn't)

[yayaya1 22]

Hey, you can raise taxes on CO$$$ in neighboring cities which will generate high demand in your main city (Amsterdam). Goodluck! Also, you should have taxes low, watered area, and plazas.

[Bdub01 201]

Hey, you can raise taxes on CO$$$ in neighboring cities which will generate high demand in your main city (Amsterdam). Goodluck! Also, you should have taxes low, watered area, and plazas.

That's good advice. But your city looks pretty good. Also take turns playing the other cities and try to keep them all within at least ten years of each other. Lower $$$C taxes in your main city. Build another city with R&C maybe a few more cities. Make the regional connections better!

[yayaya1 22]

hey frost back, how did you get all the towers?

[Turjan 1,048]

I have been looking at this city, and it seems to be going quite well. I got some teachers strike immediately after I opened it, which is partially explainable by the mod I'm using and which increases coverage radii. However, capacities are the same, so there is a slight shortage of high school coverage (but only regional) and a more severe shortage in elementary school coverage (nearly everywhere). EQ is 162, which isn't too bad. Health coverage was slightly below full, and I got one strike.

 

Air quality is so-so, and that's no wonder for a city that depends nearly exclusively on one-way roads, avenues and buses. I'm not sure which NAM simulator model you use, but in my traffic view (medium simulator), most roads in the commute direction were a deep red in the traffic volume view. You had some abandonment due to commute time. As the RTMT bus stops were only at worst in the 200%s with their usage, I'm not sure what to think. I hardly saw any bus automata, but the game can be a bit unpredictable in this regard.

 

Demand was mostly around zero, but having 500.000 inhabitants under this condition seems already good enough. It's time for some better traffic links. As you probably don't want to tear down half of your city, your best bet seems to be an underground network.

 

By the way, I immediately lowered taxes on services. As this is your main resident city, I guess a few services are needed.

 

In general, I would probably start with a neighbor city. That usually gets commercial demand up big time.

[Cefien 361]

You manage the city well, tax is good, health, education, but you still need to learn balance. This is what happen when you don't. You can't just zone and zone recklessly as soon as you see demand in certain type without thinking about what will happen next. Always check your demand graphs and you'll see what your city really need before zoning something.

That demand graph really showed that you're not play in balance.

[Prophet42 1,501]

You can also try to add things that increase commercial desirability.  Commercial like plazas, airports, convention center, connections to neighboring cities, university, television studio, etc...  Also, to increase the demand for C$$ and C$$$ you will need to increase the population of your R$$ and R$$$ sims.  Provide parks and other recreational facilities to attract wealther sims.  You can also decrease taxes to attract more of the type of buildings you want.  However, be careful with that.  A city can really get unbalanced if the tax rates are too desparent (sp???) between the wealth types.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

The city is profitable, and so is a success.  It is also rather well filled up.  Try bringing the ex-urbs up to synchronization, and lower all your taxes except industrial (should all be a 20% except maybe I-HT) to something around 7%. 

 

You apparently are in a demand doldrum, but his happens cyclically in mature cities, so you'll have to weather the storm.  A few tweaks here and there, but I don't see anything really significant.  You could try a major cap buster for C but I notice you already have an airport.  Since you are playing on default terrain, I can't really suggest adding a seaport since you have no coastline.

 

There is lots of room on that tile, so why not start an outlying village, and grow it a bit to see what happens.  Take a copy of your region before you start this and if things don't improve in, say, 50 Sim-years, you can always restore the copy.

[Turjan 1,048]

I actually played your city a bit last night, though mostly Suburb 1. Didn't touch your development there except for two small plops. I brought some residents in (about 300,000), and this without adding any public transport at all . Anyway, demand is high, and your original city started growing again. There's a noticeable slope in development strength of your CBD there that corresponds to distance from residential areas. This corroborates my earlier point of commute time being the main stumbling block for development there.

[frostback 0]

Hey, you can raise taxes on CO$$$ in neighboring cities which will generate high demand in your main city (Amsterdam). Goodluck! Also, you should have taxes low, watered area, and plazas.

I can raise the tax, plaza's etc are already there.

 

I have been looking at this city, and it seems to be going quite well. I got some teachers strike immediately after I opened it, which is partially explainable by the mod I'm using and which increases coverage radii. However, capacities are the same, so there is a slight shortage of high school coverage (but only regional) and a more severe shortage in elementary school coverage (nearly everywhere). EQ is 162, which isn't too bad. Health coverage was slightly below full, and I got one strike.

 

Air quality is so-so, and that's no wonder for a city that depends nearly exclusively on one-way roads, avenues and buses. I'm not sure which NAM simulator model you use, but in my traffic view (medium simulator), most roads in the commute direction were a deep red in the traffic volume view. You had some abandonment due to commute time. As the RTMT bus stops were only at worst in the 200%s with their usage, I'm not sure what to think. I hardly saw any bus automata, but the game can be a bit unpredictable in this regard.

 

Demand was mostly around zero, but having 500.000 inhabitants under this condition seems already good enough. It's time for some better traffic links. As you probably don't want to tear down half of your city, your best bet seems to be an underground network.

 

By the way, I immediately lowered taxes on services. As this is your main resident city, I guess a few services are needed.

 

In general, I would probably start with a neighbor city. That usually gets commercial demand up big time.

I had 4*4 blocks (as you saw) and I have a busstop every 2 blocks in both directions.

Like

XXXXXXXXXXX

XZZZZXZZZZX

XZZZZXZZZZX

XZZZZXZZZZX

BZZZZXZZZZB

XXXXXXXXXXX

XZZZZXZZZZX

XZZZZXZZZZX

XZZZZXZZZZX

BZZZZXZZZZB

XXXXXXXXXXX

X=road

B=bus on road

Z=Zone

I will try to change the busstops with bus/subwaystops and add subway's. From simcity 3000 I remember intersections are a problem EVERYWHERE, but I hate zoning without square's or rectangles xD

Since more people say so, I think Imma build some neighbour city's to.

 

ps. how can I check a shortage of a certain school? You said I have a shortage or elementary school's, is this a special mod?

I actually played your city a bit last night, though mostly Suburb 1. Didn't touch your development there except for two small plops. I brought some residents in (about 300,000), and this without adding any public transport at all . Anyway, demand is high, and your original city started growing again. There's a noticeable slope in development strength of your CBD there that corresponds to distance from residential areas. This corroborates my earlier point of commute time being the main stumbling block for development there.

 

I will try to improve my infrastructure

___________________________

 

For the rest thanks for the tips. As soon as I get some decent progress I will tell! 

[yayaya1 22]

Hey, you can raise taxes on CO$$$ in neighboring cities which will generate high demand in your main city (Amsterdam). Goodluck! Also, you should have taxes low, watered area, and plazas.

I can raise the tax, plaza's etc are already there.

 

>I have been looking at this city, and it seems to be going quite well. I got some teachers strike immediately after I opened it, which is partially explainable by the mod I'm using and which increases coverage radii. However, capacities are the same, so there is a slight shortage of high school coverage (but only regional) and a more severe shortage in elementary school coverage (nearly everywhere). EQ is 162, which isn't too bad. Health coverage was slightly below full, and I got one strike.

 

Air quality is so-so, and that's no wonder for a city that depends nearly exclusively on one-way roads, avenues and buses. I'm not sure which NAM simulator model you use, but in my traffic view (medium simulator), most roads in the commute direction were a deep red in the traffic volume view. You had some abandonment due to commute time. As the RTMT bus stops were only at worst in the 200%s with their usage, I'm not sure what to think. I hardly saw any bus automata, but the game can be a bit unpredictable in this regard.

 

Demand was mostly around zero, but having 500.000 inhabitants under this condition seems already good enough. It's time for some better traffic links. As you probably don't want to tear down half of your city, your best bet seems to be an underground network.

 

By the way, I immediately lowered taxes on services. As this is your main resident city, I guess a few services are needed.

 

In general, I would probably start with a neighbor city. That usually gets commercial demand up big time.

I had 4*4 blocks (as you saw) and I have a busstop every 2 blocks in both directions.

Like

XXXXXXXXXXX

XZZZZXZZZZX

XZZZZXZZZZX

XZZZZXZZZZX

BZZZZXZZZZB

XXXXXXXXXXX

XZZZZXZZZZX

XZZZZXZZZZX

XZZZZXZZZZX

BZZZZXZZZZB

XXXXXXXXXXX

X=road

B=bus on road

Z=Zone

I will try to change the busstops with bus/subwaystops and add subway's. From simcity 3000 I remember intersections are a problem EVERYWHERE, but I hate zoning without square's or rectangles xD

Since more people say so, I think Imma build some neighbour city's to.

 

ps. how can I check a shortage of a certain school? You said I have a shortage or elementary school's, is this a special mod?

I actually played your city a bit last night, though mostly Suburb 1. Didn't touch your development there except for two small plops. I brought some residents in (about 300,000), and this without adding any public transport at all . Anyway, demand is high, and your original city started growing again. There's a noticeable slope in development strength of your CBD there that corresponds to distance from residential areas. This corroborates my earlier point of commute time being the main stumbling block for development there.

 

I will try to improve my infrastructure

___________________________

 

For the rest thanks for the tips. As soon as I get some decent progress I will tell! 

 

No, don't raise taxes in the main city, raise it in the neighboring city!

[frostback 0]

You doubt my intelligence? I ain't stupid 

 

ofc I'll raise em in the other city's. But since I played some more now, main problem is overall low demand on CO-§§§

In a second I will update this post. 

 

Update:

 

Alright, created some more suburb's, got me some underground (not finished), increased taxrate in every city except main. Got me some extra schools..
 

This is the progress:

Demand:

Region:

 

I still got a problem with demand. It's increased a little, but not enough. I think it should be highe but I don't know why.

Traffc problem didn't actually got solved with the subways. Maybe the layout is wrong (worked quite good in SC3000....)x

Some1 got some extra tips? Please tell me!

If I am making some stupid choices, please tell me too.

 

Region:

http://www.sendspace.com/file/31t7ex
 

[frostback 0]

Any1 got some extra tips?

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Running the Amsterdam city now.  First, it is full of one-way streets with really short blocks.  In order to solve a) a school strike and b) a hospital strike I had to do some urban renewal on the blocks the buildings were on by taking out a couple of one-way roads and the properties on these lots including the school and hospital and replaced them with larger capacity buildings.  I suggest you need to find some larger capacity municipal buildings on the exchanges.

 

School:

 

Hospitals (plural):

 

Be sure you get all the dependencies for these.

 

I note that you have a demand for a neighbour connection for freight, but I haven't satisfied that.  More later on.

 

LATER:  Found these general problems in this city

 

• Municipal services budgets are all maxed and there is no more room for them to expand.  You need more or bigger schools, hospitals, etc.
• Water grid is not needed in such a pattern.  The water should be in pipes parallel to each other without crosses, six grid squares apart.  You have a 5 x 5 grid, which is wastefully expensive.
• Your road grid of one-way streets is too tight.  5 x 5 grid blocks are wasteful.  Try a new city and use 8 x 2 blocks for low density houses consisting of 2 x 1 low density lots.
• You have too many residential high rises and many of them have degraded to a lower level.
• A partially completed industrial site with waste to energy power showing power zots because the power plant budgets were zeroed.  Turned one of them on, and the power zots went away.
• School and hospital strikes all over the place, and everything maxed.  See above.

I am not surprised Sims don't want to live there.  The medical and other social things are maxed out so there is no availability for any additional services.

 

I did not run any of the peripheral cities.

 

If you want to run a port city, you should use a map that has some seaside.  Here are a couple of mine:

 

 

 

Both of these are rendered using the game.  No external tools required.

 

Start a new region and this time, do not layout a grid in advance.  Work on growing your cities from towns and villages and farming junctions.  Take your time.  Run in turtle at the start in hard mode.  Get it profitable and go from there. 

 

Cities do not spring to being overnight. 

 

If you want good port facilities you could use the set I use from Simpeg (free registration) and look at the CDK3 port set.  Read carefully to be sure you get all the requirements.  These ports are enabled for both road and rail.

[Jim14409 448]

I played Amsterdam for a few minutes yesterday and agree with Nonny that there are a lot of one-way streets and short blocks. In my opinion way too many one way streets. You might consider breaking things up. Adding more green and open areas. I realize you are going for a high population count but sometimes Sims find what is pleasant to the eye to be more enticing than the concrete and glass environment you have given them.

 

Perhaps you might think of your roads more like the structure of a tree turned upside down as pertains to traffic flow. Small streets lead into larger roads which lead into avenues which lead into highways, etc. If you use RHW then you can utilize those pieces to further extend the structure.

 

No offence to you or your planning at all is intended but your city reminded me of the scenes I remember seeing back in the old Iron Curtain days before Ronald Reagan said, Mr. Gorbechav, tear down this wall!

 

Your buildings will grow taller and more plentiful with a greener environment. This is not only lots of parks, plazas, but empty space filled with trees with the God mode.

[frostback 0]

Haha Jim I know, just trying to fix the traffic problem.

I know the 5x5 is quite small, but I had some tries and nothing worked, this I found the best. Now I've read here that traffic is "bugged" a little in SC4.

Anyway both of you thanks a lot. I don't have time to overlook everything now, but I am planning on taking this with me and start over.

I think it just leaves me with one question:

How should I grid the area's? I always feel like having rectangles/squares and if possible continious. 8x2 is good for low dens residential, but what about High dens commercial? High dense residential? And what is a "good" layout with roads, ave's, etc. for such a metropolis?
 

If there is some guide for this a link is perfectly fine as an awnser.

And again, thanks a lot for the info!

[Bdub01 201]

http://infinitezenith.webs.com/Site/Building%20Successful%20Cities.pdf

This is a pretty good site I believe!

[Jasoncw 11,840]

You should download and install the Network Addon Modd (NAM).  The traffic simulator that came with the game is buggy and dysfunctional and the NAM fixes it. 

 

You also don't have to worry too much about taxes.  If all of the other factors that you need to grow your city like high education and good transportation and desirability and that other stuff, then your city will grow even if your taxes are all set to the defaults.

[Turjan 1,048]

Actually, I didn't look at your changed map, but I have to admit I'm still playing your region. I have been bulldozing and changing quite a bit, although I guess a little bit more radical might have a better effect.

 

To not keep this as an inane rambling level, I would suggest to have real neighbor cities with inhabitants, which is lacking so far. Next time, try not to make the neighbor connections on the corners, which usually leads to trouble, especially if you have residential areas in the vicinity.

 

I know that many people suggest to keep a city solely for dirty industry, but keep in mind that low wealth people don't mind the pollution that much (I guess they don't have much of a choice). You can build their homes on the same tile as the I-D, and they will even live right next to the coal power plants, even if those places will be taken last.That keeps traffic down.

 

In a similar vein, I just see whether I can change your city by intermixing. If I see delapidated or downgraded residential buildings due to commute time, I replace them with commerce. On the other hand, I replace struggling commerce in those big blocks with residentials. It seems to work to some extent, although I haven't run that long enough so far to give a definite answer.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Keep your grid "in petto" as they say in Rome.  Plan for it, but don't lay it down.  Here is an example of a very successful port I have built.

 

[Jim14409 448]

Keep your grid "in petto" as they say in Rome.  Plan for it, but don't lay it down.  Here is an example of a very successful port I have built.

 

Your port looks good but I have a question that is not intended to offend so please bear with me.

 

Do you think it looks realistic for many or most of your residences to have a street on both the front and back side of the same property? I've never been to Canada (want to ride your trains!) but here in the States there is usually at least two properties sandwiched between streets, roads etc when in city limits. Most cities and towns would go broke just trying to keep the number of streets paved as your pic seems to suggest.

 

I'm not saying it is wrong, it is not, just different than I'm used to. Thanks for tolerating my comment.

 

edit: correct typo

  Edited February 20, 2013 by Jim14409  

[TahR 31]

I think indeed you should have some more parks and plazas in your city. It isn't that hard: what I managed to do in my city, which exists of three big islands, is building a big "Central Park" area with only grass and trees and that stuff, and the whole rest of the island didn't need any more parks or plaza's.

 

I can also post a pic of my zoning, which has a lot of variety in it, although my transport network isn't as great.. A lot of people suggest one way roads in big metropolisses, but I didn't make them as I think it's too much work.

 

Good luck with your city!

 

(En blij om hier ook een Nederlander tegen te komen, haha!)

 

P.S. @Jim14409: in the Netherlands it's a common sight to have a street at the front and as well at the back of your property. Though I don't know how that is in America nor Canada, where everything is a bit greater of course!

[frostback 0]

I think indeed you should have some more parks and plazas in your city. It isn't that hard: what I managed to do in my city, which exists of three big islands, is building a big "Central Park" area with only grass and trees and that stuff, and the whole rest of the island didn't need any more parks or plaza's.

 

I can also post a pic of my zoning, which has a lot of variety in it, although my transport network isn't as great.. A lot of people suggest one way roads in big metropolisses, but I didn't make them as I think it's too much work.

 

Good luck with your city!

 

(En blij om hier ook een Nederlander tegen te komen, haha!)

 

P.S. @Jim14409: in the Netherlands it's a common sight to have a street at the front and as well at the back of your property. Though I don't know how that is in America nor Canada, where everything is a bit greater of course!

Leuk inderdaad haha.

Anyway, tnxs for the help. I am quite busy at the moment, so I will play some more when I have some time. 

[Turjan 1,048]

I hope you have still some fun. At least I still have fun fooling around with your stuff. Scratch that what I said about low wealth people before. There are even villas next to the coal power plants when I added some residential and commercial zones to your dirty industry city on the strip you left blank:

 

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

@Jim14409:  If you look closely, the streets all have properties facing them.  The lots are 2 x 1 not 1 x 2.  This is an example of a really packed neighbourhood.  I don't use the default layout, and pretty much hand-zone everything.  The default degrades into 4 x 4 mansions, and I simply don't allow that by not zoning back to back 1 x 2.  I have many lots off the exchanges that are 1 x 2, and the Maxis low density lots will also build on 1 x 2.  2 x 1 is for Silicon Valley tract houses.  I don't care for that kind of poor land use.  If I want an occasional mansion, I zone a 4 x 4, 4 x 3 or 3 x 3 lot.

[Turjan 1,048]

I don't care for that kind of poor land use.

 

I wouldn't either, but I have learned to cherish them as ideal places to plop civics and landmarks later on.

[frostback 0]

@Jim14409:  If you look closely, the streets all have properties facing them.  The lots are 2 x 1 not 1 x 2.  This is an example of a really packed neighbourhood.  I don't use the default layout, and pretty much hand-zone everything.  The default degrades into 4 x 4 mansions, and I simply don't allow that by not zoning back to back 1 x 2.  I have many lots off the exchanges that are 1 x 2, and the Maxis low density lots will also build on 1 x 2.  2 x 1 is for Silicon Valley tract houses.  I don't care for that kind of poor land use.  If I want an occasional mansion, I zone a 4 x 4, 4 x 3 or 3 x 3 lot.

You don't want 2 blocks wide 1 block long? I don't really understand why....

 

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

^ The lots are poor land use.  How many real housing lots do you find that are 32 meters (105 feet) deep and 16 meters (52.5) feet wide in a city?  The game won't use 1 x 1 lots until stage 3, so my 2 x 1s are a compromise.  The game often converts them to 1 x 1 which is still gigantic in urban terms, and builds to houses for me.  Later on, I often zone 1 x 1 low density blocks once I know they'll get built.  This also applies to CS$, CS$$ and some CO$$ (I've downloaded a few).

 

In some cities these days 25 foot frontage is considered possible, and the first house I owned had a 35 foot frontage.  All the rest except the last had at least 50 foot frontages, but not necessarily corresponding depth.  My last place was 100 x 150' (leased lot).  The dogs loved it.

 

If I could I would zone some half grid lots 8 x 16.  You can see some of this because there are some Maxis lots that have two houses on a 1 x 1 lot.  The game will also place mobile homes.