How to (slightly) break the grid.

[Northern Pyro 4]

I want to start a CJ, but need help with roads. I want my region to have break-the-grid roads without actually breaking the grid. (I.E. not be block after block, but still follow orthogonal road directions) I am not sure how to go about doing this. I tried it before, but with little success.

 

The main thing I want it to be like is too look unplanned, like London or Boston, especially Boston, with confusing one way roads.

 

As soon as the road grid is up, I can figure out the one way roads. Find a road a lot of people are going on, one-way it, and then one-way the other direction with whatever road they spill onto, repeat.

 

P.S. The region I will be using will be the ultra high detail Seattle: 

[Lost Realist 762]

You should take a trip to Google Maps and look at some bigger German cities like Berlin, Hamburg or Bremen. They are not gridded thoroughly but still follow rough patterns here and there. I'd suggest scanning those places and trying to understand what makes them look the way they do. Let them drive your creativity.

[Ltw 401]

It's also important what kind of style you want to use. The European '60 CIAM style is very structured with high density and mid-density. This style has a lot of green and is designed for public transport and as less cars as possible. If you want to implement this style in a part of your city you could use a Simcity 4 default-like grid. The '70s style that you could see in cities in for example The Netherlands is less structured, although there is a pattern. It reminds me a bit of the american suburbs. However, the European style is mainly semi-structured with roads from the center that lead to surrounding cities. These roads aren't in a pattern because they were placed when there wasn't a city in that place. It might help to start at a certain point and build roads from that point on in every direction. At a certain point you could create the semi-structured pattern with roads in every direction and a sort of patterned grid in between.

 

A good american example is Boston. This is an american city with a historical center, if you want to implement an american grid-style this might be the city to look at. You could see that the've tried to make it a grid outside of the city center but they couldn't achieve that goal completely because there are certain roads that couldn't be changed.