Ground water drying up too fast!

[Vinicius Maciel 0]

Mayors, I have a 100k city (specialized on mining and trading raw materials)... The ground has plenty of water, but what happens is that the water dries up too freakin fast! I'm at year 3, and I had to move my water pumps 3 times around the city because of repeated water shortages... And that just ruins my city planning since I have to demolish other areas to get water from the ground... have you been through something like that? Any ideas on the issue?

 

Thanks.

[Catchin22 299]

Import your water and or build a sewage treatment plant with a pump near it.

[SilentKK8 1]

Import water for now, but begin building sewage treatment around your water pump.  The treated water will refill your ground water but it takes time

[gmart530 6]

It's frustrating but as stated above, put a sewage plant next to your pump.  That, or put the water pump basically on a shoreline.  I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that water as a resource will be tuned in the future.  I find it so counter intuitive to have 2 different service buildings that basically have to be built together if you're building a city.  A fully built water pump+sewage plant is probably the largest civic in the game after maybe an elaborate windfarm setup.  I hate the fact I have to dedicate so much space to it.

[McFluffy 4]

Yeah I have read officialy from Maxis that it is suppose to refill when it rains. Also read about building near a shore, but not read anything official on that

[Vinicius Maciel 0]

Thanks guys... Yea, we've been having some space problems with the tiny maps... I followed you guys' advices and built water filters by my sewage treatment plant... (Ewww...). Seems to be working.

[gmart530 6]

Thanks guys... Yea, we've been having some space problems with the tiny maps... I followed you guys' advices and built water filters by my sewage treatment plant... (Ewww...). Seems to be working.

 

It should be noted that the water table will still be polluted if built near something that causes significant ground pollution.  My first city had a sort of "utilities" area which had my Nuclear Power plant.  Needless to say it polluted my water table and 200K sims are drinking "filthy" grade water.  Not sure if filtration helps at that point.

[Vinicius Maciel 0]

Thanks guys... Yea, we've been having some space problems with the tiny maps... I followed you guys' advices and built water filters by my sewage treatment plant... (Ewww...). Seems to be working.

 

It should be noted that the water table will still be polluted if built near something that causes significant ground pollution.  My first city had a sort of "utilities" area which had my Nuclear Power plant.  Needless to say it polluted my water table and 200K sims are drinking "filthy" grade water.  Not sure if filtration helps at that point.

I haven't gone nuclear yet, but I believe filtration really isn't really able to remove radiation from water... But regular ground polution responds well to filters...

[sousvide 0]

i had the same problem - I took me finding out here to build the sewage treatment plant close to the water pumps.  In the end though, I ended up switching maps to one with a lot more water on it.  I haven't had a problem since - have not had to move my water pump at all.

[gmart530 6]

I haven't gone nuclear yet, but I believe filtration really isn't really able to remove radiation from water... But regular ground polution responds well to filters...

 

 

This happened to me on another map though where the pump was near a high tech industry section.

[kgpurrs 107]

Make a U filled with water filtration upgrades, remove the 1 water pump.  Make a road and plop a sewage out-pipe in the U to pollute the ground with feces.  This will support your water needs for populations over 600k.  I currently have 600k population and am selling water to neighbors with this method. Keep the garbage dump as close as possible and oil/coal power plants to increase the ground pollution.

[g5todd 5]

I will try the sewage idea....but my orginally solution was I built a city just purely to provide other cities with water and other ulitilites...

[ricomon35 10]

Going to use the U shaped system myself, and thank you kgpurrs for that excellent tricksy !

 

A note on the radiation clean-up, I had a nuclear meltdown just last night in a oil/ore/coal Ind city.

 

I used repeated plantings of trees to eventually absorb the Rads out of the ground/air. It took ALOT of trees to do this btw.

 

Rico AKA Nonja

[g5todd 5]

btw the sewage plant by the water plant worked for me

[Brusilov 2]

It also worked for me..... thanks very much!

[solitudes 4]

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/812/fkingwasteofmoney.jpg/ is this style ok.? I am still having issues with water and I am not selling sewage to other cities, sewage capacity is bigger than the water request but the water consumption is increasing all the time even if i am not making significant changes in the city and the water reserve under the water pump is decreasing slowly ... any suggestions? thank you in advance.

[TuPhat 27]

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/812/fkingwasteofmoney.jpg/ is this style ok.? I am still having issues with water and I am not selling sewage to other cities, sewage capacity is bigger than the water request but the water consumption is increasing all the time even if i am not making significant changes in the city and the water reserve under the water pump is decreasing slowly ... any suggestions? thank you in advance.

 

Yes, that is exactly how it should be set up.   The sewage treatment plant will constantly refill the water table, but unfortunately in your case it looks like the water table is extremely low in that area.   You may have to plop down the water plant in another area at this point, or import water until the sewage treatment plant refills the water table enough in that area.  

[solitudes 4]

this game is totally a piece of crap. I am thinking to a refund, because I still have several days in which I can ask for my money to be granted back ( EU rules ). So , I am having 300 kgal of excess water BUT HALF OF MY TOWN is not having water, industry is closing and EA can suck me.. on the other hands I do not see the sewage to replenish the water, in fact it;s all gone compared to yesterday this time...

[moaku 74]

if you put a sweage treatment plant and have no ground polution around, you can use normal water pumps without filters next to it, water treatment plant cleans the water, so no need to refilter it.
Water pump / tower next to treatment plant == infinite water.

Enjoy.

[solitudes 4]

if you put a sweage treatment plant and have no ground polution around, you can use normal water pumps without filters next to it, water treatment plant cleans the water, so no need to refilter it.

Water pump / tower next to treatment plant == infinite water.

Enjoy.

i have 360 kgal of extra water, but half of city is not supplied with water, industry is going down. so.. enjoy what?

[moaku 74]

that's another problem... I never had a such issue (except when going out of electricity, there my pumps stop working and it takes time to refill the whole city pipes).

maybe road density also affects the quantity of water it can transport ? Have you tried upgrading the road to your pump? Has it easy access to a main avenue? have you employment problems in your town (see in population status - detail)?

[solitudes 4]

all roads are at highest state possible. plenty of water, plenty of electricity, 160k population, 8000k money. half of the city is in a desert.. I will try to take a printscreen, but it was a pain to take one last time, and to show you that I have a full water station with one big treatment station near it, 360 kgal of water but half of the city screaming for water 

while I was trying to deal with the printscreen, I exited from the game. started again, large file to be processed or smth like this, restart, ok, now the city is supplied entirely, but a lower rate..

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/59/crapgame.jpg/ as you can see, plenty of available water, roads, but a lot of signs related to poor water availability.

[moaku 74]

I believe you, it's just that I didn't personnaly had a similar situation, so i'm wondering how you could have reach a such point.

EDIT: After seeing your screenshot, the only thing I can come up with to explain that is that you're pumping into a "low water density" zone, which make your pump pumping, but at lowered rate.

This should improve after 10-20 minutes (real time) of playing your city, when the treatment plant repleinish the water around it. Anyway, during the wait, to survive without having all your people leaving for no water, you should provide water from another city, just the time to have the water under your pump to repleinish to "dark blue".

Good luck anyway

[solitudes 4]

what is strange is that the waterpump sucked up all the water from the area, despite a big a sewage station there. I will try to combination with those small sewage stations with no filtering. but the main issue is that, even on this image there were 130 kgal of free water, but still problems.. and I am starting to be really tired of this game. not to mention the 80 eur thrown to garbage...

[ScottyDoesKnow 8]

https://i.imgur.com/xIoS9NK.jpg

 

Here's mine that seems to work fine for 160k pop. That's been running for a long long time, the rest of my map is bone white (seems like it actually slowly dries over time). Using 186.3/385.5 sewage and 191.4/666 water. You'll notice that it doesn't seem to matter where the sewage treatment addons are, you want to center around the actual sewage plant as much as possible.

[Freeseus 1]

Does anyone know if Maxis is preparing a fix for this? This is the single largest game-breaking issue for me at this moment.

These things have NOT worked for me (my pumps still dry up anyway):

• Building a water pump near the ocean/lake etc
• Buying water from your neighbor city (it will dry out their lands)
• Sewage treatment plant (placed anywhere)

 

Is it possible to buy water off the global market (haven't done a trade city yet, so I haven't looked)?

 

Any help is greatly appreciated.

[asasa45454 4]

AFAIK buying resources from a neighbor doesnt actually take anything from them, its all fake.

 

The "resources dried out" or whatever baloney the game says makes no sense, as it happens when you meet your own water needs and no longer need imported water..

 

Its all a fake to make it seem like the multiplayer is actually complex.

 

Sewage treatment always works, you must be placing it wrong or not have enough sewage. Unlike the image shown earlier, they should not branch off of the same road. The water treatment facility should be back to back with the sewage plant, and the sewage plant should wrap around it.

[TuxedoKamen 1]

This is very counter-intuitive (and not at all realistic for a game that is supposed to simulate life).

 

I purposely placed my water wells far away from the sewage dump.  Turns out I have to place it right next to each other.

 

Not impressed

[Cob92 360]

This is very counter-intuitive (and not at all realistic for a game that is supposed to simulate life).

 

I purposely placed my water wells far away from the sewage dump.  Turns out I have to place it right next to each other.

 

Not impressed

 

Actually it's perfectly realistic. Treated sewage goes back into the water system.

[Pygma 24]

When it comes to ground water drying out, theres something else i run into. Even if i dont drain any water myself and import all the water needed, the ground is drying out. I think its stronger the higher the density of the buildings is. After some years and plenty high rise buildings, the complete area has dried out. Its all white on the water table.

 

-> what causes this? Is it due to rain not refilling the water table? and water is drained permanently? Like for plants etc and cleaning the ground or something?