population Hi! Any tips to get a population of 400,000+ in a city? Thanx!

[TeddyAbbie 2]

Hello People!

I've downloaded some mods such as NAM, pollution plant reducer (can't remember the name) and traffic pollution reducer etc. Which makes my city look nice.. But I was wondering how to keep your city successful?

So no people move out & get bored.. In the small cities I also make a industry-only city too.

 

For instance, just say if I have 50,000 Sims living in my city.. how many schools do I need? How many hospitals do I need?

 

Thanks very much guys :-)

Have a good day.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

This is a matter of climbing the learning curve.  For instance you'll notice that civic buildings such as schools have an operating radius that is usually controlled by a slider in the building query.  Just make sure you have good coverage and adjust as needed.  The most important thing in a single city is desirability.  Watch your desirability display for each class.  Red areas may need some fixing. 

 

To get high population you need to maintain a good balance.  Unless you are using a mod such as the CAM, the general ratio of Sims to Jobs is 2 to 1.  The game believes in core families with momma staying home to raise the kids.

 

You will also have to limit the game's early placement of R$$$ mansions on single occupancy residential lots.  It does this by consolidating four 1 x 2 low density lots (default) into a 4 x 4.  To prevent this there are several strategies.  I manually zone my early low density residential lots as 2 x 1.  This can be seen in this example:

 

Beyond this it is a matter of developing as a player.  There is no instant city magic.  Playing regionally with multiple cities adjacent to each other with good neighbour connections can offer better play than just playing one city.  Currently I am running four regions.  The most developed is a version of New York City (not the game default one) and it looks like this:

 

Or did when I made that snapshot 3 months ago. It has been seriously developed since.

[TeddyAbbie 2]

Thanks for the advice. I've made a city and zoned low residential, low commercial & medium in literally 6 cities so far. (Added schools, libraries & police & stuff & made the funding just right) cities are about 5,00-6,00.

I'll continue to do this kind of thing with my other cities and then I can start too add medium and high density.

By the way your city looks really inspiring & cool! :-)

*medium industry

[APSMS 1,892]

I have, currently, three cities (out of a whole bunch) that have pop. over 400 000. The deal with me is that I usually don't like crazy ultra dense cities.

 

However, I use money cheats to build large swaths of infrastructure at once, and go from there. If you aren't willing to do that, it takes longer, but I've found that it can still be done quickly with A Nonny Moose's advice. Keep demand high and avoid, or bulldoze, the large R$$$ mansions when they appear, since they have a tendency to not upgrade.

 

I have installed my CAM correctly, and the job stats are still off (due to some other mods not yet properly installed), but when installed correctly the CAM should not affect default job hiring behavior. A good cheat with the CAM, though, when installed wrong, is that it will make the region appear to have double population, which will make buildings (of any density) grow much quicker than usual.

 

You will, though, at some point realize that the in-game advice (build out before you build up), can be ignored once you understand the way the game works for you. Unfortunately I haven't found a way to turn them off without turning off urgent (Red) messages.

 

My biggest city is surrounded with large amounts of smaller cities which I play less often. They still increase region-wide demand, even if you rarely play them, because of the influence of the primary city.

[Indiana Joe 1,750]

Plopping more civics won't be too much of a problem.  But you need to plan for lots and lots and lots and lots of commuters.  Mass transit out the wazoo, highway infrastructure.

 

If the city isn't laid out with high density in mind, it will succumb to abandonment and crumble.

[Mcnamara 1]

Hey Moose, is that a highway in the middle of the big city Lomokome? I still haven't used highways because I do not plan for them... yet. But just a question, highway in the middle of most cities?

 

 


Or did when I made that snapshot 3 months ago. It has been seriously developed since.

 

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Remember that I am working on a multi-community basis.  I have several towns per large tile, and yes its a highway (Maxis).  Here's a newer snapshot:
 


As you can see there are several population centres here.  The elevated rail picks up a subway connection from one of the tiles to the south.  I am currently working on the transportation system because part of it is overloaded in what I think my be a commuter loop.  These cities are currently making most of their income from tolls and transit fees.

 

Yes, that's a big, ugly default cloverleaf in the intersection of the two highways.  Reminds me of my childhood when there was one like that just outside of town.

 

And if you are curious, the name Lomokome comes from an Edgar Rice Burroughs story of a civilization on the Moon called Lomokome.  If you want to read it, the title is "The Lomokome Papers".

[Mcnamara 1]

Several towns per large tile. Got it, sounds fun, let's start tonight!

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Several towns per large tile. Got it, sounds fun, let's start tonight!

The only problem is that you can't name them separately and you are stuck with a consolidated budget.