Excessive CS$$ Demand

[Prophet42 1,500]

I have this region that I would consider 'mature'.  The region has about 1.25 million sims and has grown from being mainly an agriculuture region to a metropolis.  Anyway, as the region grew in population, my residential demand has remained high.  Agriculture and dirty industry demand has dropped off as expected with I-HT demand growing.  However, as the cities in the region grew, commercial demand dropped off except for medium wealth commercial services.  No matter how much commercial I zoned, the other commercial demand dropped off (sometimes into negative) while CS$$ remained pegged out.

 

The only solution I have found so far is to go into every city and bulldoze most of the CS$$$ and CO$$$.  Then when the zones are rebuilt, if any CS$$ appears I mark it historical so it can't redevelop into another commercial type.  This is very tedious, however, I have managed to get my CO$$$ demand to increase.  CS$$ demand has not budged.

 

Has anybody found a better way to satisfy the CS$$ demand (without using a mod)?

 

BTW, I do have NAM 31 installed and have installed many CS$$ buildings from the STEX (like the Madhatter comercial packs).

[Bdub01 201]

I would suggest if you have a small tile empty make it a CS$$ only city to eat up that demand. Raise taxes on all other commercial and see if that works. I've had to do that with C$ before.

[Prophet42 1,500]

Thanks for the tips Bdub01.  Unfortunately all region tiles are being used.  I have also tried playing with the taxes.  Lowering taxes on all but the CS$$, does increase demand a little for the rest of commercial, but not by much.  Even with playing with taxes, the CS$$ demand stays pegged.

 

I should note, that if I don't mark the CS$$ historical, within a few minutes the game will redevelop the lots into CS$$S or CO$$$.  SC4 seems to have an affinity for developing high wealth lots.

[azxcvbnm321 17]

What are your education levels?  Sounds like you have a lot of medium wealth sims with moderate education.  At the highest education levels, high tech industry and commercial offices will be more in demand, but CS$$ will always be very high because you have so many medium wealth sims running around (as should be).  I have around 900,000 in my region with one city having 600,000.  High tech industry seems insatiable, same with CS $ and CS $$.  Unless you have abandonment with your CO $$$ and CO $$, there isn't really a problem, that will create more demand for sims through open jobs and that will allow your cities to grow further.

[atsummerlin53 47]

You might not like this but you might download a few CS$$ lots/bats with large #s of CS$$ jobs and just start plopping away. Some of the mid-rise size lots on the STEX actually have unrealistically large numbers of jobs and I'll frequently use them as a means of catching up to job demand so that my residential development doesn't suffer while my commercial zones catch up. Plus, if I already have a nice business district developing, I can add to it with a landmark plop w/ jobs rather than hoping the building I want develops there. Plus, if I decide to keep it, that building will never re-develop and the bulk of my commercial zones will take care of the other demand that's out there.

[cogeo 960]

@Prophet42: I'm not sure what you want to do with your cities and region, but what most players usually want is grow the cities bigger. Then the solution is quite obvious (also taking into account that you are running out of space), that is grow your cities more vertically. This shouldn't be a problem for R, because you have high R demand as you said. Why don't you try to satisfy this demand? It's what most players would do. Just get some more condos and residential towers. A higher population means higher CS demand too (of the respective wealth level, eg more R$$ sims will create additional CS$$ demand, as soon as they come in). If you educate them (full coverage, elementary + high schools, libraries, college/university, museum) you will get additional CO demand in a few gameyears. Actually CO demand (esp CO$$) will to some degree increase as soon as your new sims come in, because R$$ and R$$$ newcomers have an initial higher (than R$) EQ.

 

As you are running out of space, I would suggest  against zoning for more industry (of any kind), and stick with residential and commercial. I would even consider bulldozing some I-R and/or I-D, to make room for R and C. Don't worry about jobs, satisfying CS$$ and CS$ demand would create more jobs (mostly low-paid) than the ones you will lose by bulldozing I-R/I-D, taking up much less space, polluting very little, consuming less power and paying high taxes (CS$$ and CS$$$). Many birds with one stone here!

 

No demand type is really insatiable. The reason why you can't keep CS$$ is maybe because you have not many CS$$ lots already! The game won't grow the bigger CS$$ buildings, until you have a substantial number of smaller ones. Probably you get some small/medium shops, but these are easily upgraded to a small office, or a stupid boutique, with 9 jobs! Larger buildings aren't replaced so easily. Another reason is that your C areas are mixed and somehow "fragmented". Please note that a CS$$$ boutique won't be upgraded to anything else other than higher-density CS$$$; it won't even be merged with a CO$$$ office, to form a larger CO$$$ lot; it can only be merged with another CS$$$ one. In such cases it may even be preferable to use the bulldozer to demolish "unwanted" development, and try rezoning (preferably to larger, consolidated zones).

 

I have successfully managed to utilise the "transitional aura effect" of parks and plazas to temporarily increase desirability and cause the development I wish. I have made some special lots for this (1x1 parks and plazas with extreme desirabilty effect, which you plop, get the development and then bulldoze) - I could make them available to you if you want. You can even plant trees ON the lots you wish to upgrade. I can basically get what I want where I want. Take a look at also (the pic). This "controlled" and "aligned", almost "commanded" development is the result of this technique. The post describes the technique in detail. It's tedious, but it does work.

 

What this technique requires is knowledge of the buildings, lot sizes and growth stages available. They are located in simcity_1.dat, use iLives Navigator Tool to see the lists. Also keep in mind the following two tips:
- A lot may only be upgraded (or merged with) a larger (higher-stage) lot of the same type, or to a wealthier lot.
- An lot may only be upgraded again at least 6 game-months since the last upgrade.

 

I would also recommend against setting taxes to a level other than the neutral rate (unless you want to block a certain development type, in which case you should set the corresponding rate to 15% or more). Higher taxes decrease demand, lower taxes can cause more than  normal development, which unfortunately tends to not fare very well. If you have lowered certain tax rates a lot, you should slowly increase them (if demand is negative better wait a little, until it gets positive again, or at least around zero). Also check for possible demand caps.

 

@Bdub01: As said above, I would recommend againd taxing all other development types out, instead I would recommend satisfying the other (wealthier) demand types first. Take a look at my CS$ area in the link above.

 

@azxcvbnm321: Again, no demand type is insatiable, all can be satisfied. CO and I-HT are deternined by the availabilty of highly-educated workforce, and are actually quite easy to eat them up. CS instead is determined by the population, regarding sims mostly as "customers", rather than workers (R$ pop creates CS$ demand, R$$ created CS$$, and R$$$ CS$$$). You can easily see this, immediately after you develop a residential tower, or even a condo).

 

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Here we are again talking about balance. 

 

Why are you getting C$$$ buildings? 

 

Have you zoned high density commercial? 

 

Is your EQ over 120? 

 

Have you got lots of parks and plazas in your downtown? 

 

And what's the state of your CS$ demand? 

 

Do you have a nice bell curve on the education by age graph?

 

The population controls the demand for commercial by being educated.  The growth of commercial is available employees, zoning, and environment.

 

Do you want $$$ stuff?  If not, set the taxes to 20%.

 

Remember, if you have more than about 15% R$$$ it is probably time to invite some of them to leave (taxes).

[Prophet42 1,500]

Thanks all for your many excellent suggestions.  I will try them and see if I can't even out my commercial demand.  To answer A Nonny Mooses questions:

 

1) I'm not sure why I'm getting mainly C$$$ buildings?  My demand for C$$$ is half as much as my demand for C$$

2) My EQ in the majority of my cities is above 180

3) I have a fair amount of parks and plaza's in my downtown.  However in my other cities, I have been bulldozing the CO$$$ lots so CS$$ lots redevelop to try to even out the demand.

4) My C$ demand is either negative or flat.

5) The bell curve is sweet.

 

I guess my main goal is to boost CO$$$ to prevent any downtown skyscrapers from becoming abandoned.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

The game is programmed to wind up with pin cushion down-towns full of CO$$$.  Seems the developers wrote what they knew best which is downtown L.A.  There is enough openness in the game, however, to avoid this.  You do get to the point where it goes nuts with this, however.  In that case, zone lots of 4 x 4 high density residential and let the chips fall where they may.

 

If you get C abandonment, try zoning them to a lower density.