Education Help Requested!

[RebelDave 0]

OK, So I am at a quandry, and I think it stems from lack of knowledge.

BACKGROUND:
I am not new to the franchise, ive played every game to date.
Ive only recently gotten back into the game.
Ive read plenty of articles and watched plenty of videos regarding road structure and zoning.
I have a large city, filled the map, im making plenty of cash through trading. As it stands, it is essentially successful... i have over 20mil in

the bank.

THE GOOD
Financially Stable.
Healthy Bank balance (20+ million)
Clean - little to no pollution
No Water, Power or Sewerage issues
No Garbage problems


THE BAD
Commecial complaining of lack of Freight (Probably due to minimal industrial overall) Not a huge concern, as my processor and recyling system is drawing in half a million (while my taxes make a loss)
(So financial stability is not an issue... as i understand it)

My road structure has fallen (not by design) into a grid type system. I am aware this is not ideal. I have a street car avenue running the perimieter of my city, with a street car running across the centre (not from my city entrance)

Not sure i have a correct variety (assuming there is such a thing) of the right wealth value of sims.

My land values seems high overall that it prevents me zoning for low wealth sims

MY AIMS
To create a successful city, without using the Cities of Tomorrow content. As and when my city is as good as i can get it, with few complaints and no further way to improve things, will I 'take the next step' and start going futuristic (With the singular excepetion of the Solar Apmplifier at my power plant... as provided by another city, run by another player, in my region)

MY CURRENT MAJOR CONCERN
My education system is a mess...
I have a Uni, (probably not close enough to my Industry)
I have a Community College
I have 2 High Schools (opposite ends of my residential areas)
I have 3 Grade schools, (distributed equally around my residential zones)

I have residential buildings shouting about education, and going abandoned, when there is a school ACROSS THE ROAD from them.

I have school bus stops situated thoughout my residential areas.... ive added more, thinned them down, placed them on the roads directly in front of

the buildings, removed excessive stops, etc.

I have Bus stops (not placed too close to one another), I have streetcar stations on my avenues, again not too close (I dont think).
My school attendances seems to be low... nowhere near capacity for even a basic school with no upgrades.
My Uni is not getting anywhere near the 2000 students a day it needs.

MY QUESTIONS
How far will sims walk to a bus stop? (In case I have too many, and busses are stopping too frequently, clogging up traffic)
Do i need the various education systems? Or are the other schools drawing students away from the uni?
How many bus stops should I be looking at?
How does the system populate schools?
Do I need all the various schools? Are they wealth dependant? (Will Mid wealth sims use Grade schools? (for example))
Do I have too many busses?
Why do my busses seem to skip streets entirely?

WHAT IVE TRIED
Redesigning my school bus stops system
Cutting out some of the cross roads to minimise the grid pattern.
Placing bus stops on BOTH sides of the street (Seems to have no effect)
Turning off schools in various combinations in the hopes of driving students to other schools (Not as effective as I would like)


Please advise!

[CapTon 592]

Thanks for the lengthy post this benefits me.

 

Here's what may be the problem with your education: you have two colleges. One community college and one university. Not good. You need to get rid of one (this'll help boost industrial tech level).

 

As for your questions:

 

 

MY QUESTIONS
How far will sims walk to a bus stop? (In case I have too many, and busses are stopping too frequently, clogging up traffic)
Do i need the various education systems? Or are the other schools drawing students away from the uni?
How many bus stops should I be looking at?
How does the system populate schools?
Do I need all the various schools? Are they wealth dependant? (Will Mid wealth sims use Grade schools? (for example))
Do I have too many busses?
Why do my busses seem to skip streets entirely?

 

- Sims will walk to the bus stop that is closest to them unless it is too far away. If residential area roads are not covered in green when looking at the Bus Coverage data map, then Sims will not walk to any bus stops.

- If you have a university AND a community college, things won't work out all too well. You need to drop one of them.

- Place as many bus stops as needed to cover all residential areas. Make sure every residential road you have is covered in green when looking at the Bus Coverage data map.

- Sims fill one school. Once one school is filled, they move on to the next one. If there isn't another one, people start complaining.

- They are not wealth-dependent except for maybe the colleges. Lower and middle density students may go to the community college while the high density students go to the university. However, this may not be true.

- You can never have too many buses unless it's costing you money.

- The buses will skip streets that don't have any bus stops on them.

 

Hope this helped!

[RebelDave 0]

You say sims will fill a school before starting the next.... I find this is not the case.

 

Schools across the street from resdients complaining of no schools are nowhere near capacity, but they still will not attend... even with a busstop on their doorstep.

 

When I have 2 schools at less than half capacity, and all residential areas in green with bus access.... if i close one school, I dont get that number of students added to the other school... simply more residents complaining of a lack of schools. (So I assume this is a transport issue.... despite there being school bus stops outside their homes)

[CapTon 592]

It sort of depends on how long you're waiting for the transfer. It'll eventually happen, I believe. Not sure why it wouldn't.

[Gregorfp 15]

the educational system is not functional yet. Sims don't go to school even if you have 6 schools on a city... they don't commute, and they don't use school buses as they should...

I think it has something to do with the game agent system ...

 

BTW is soooo funny to watch school buses follow each other in every stop... they are like zombies school bus drivers... lol

[UncleSim 2]

The garbage truck drivers are smarter than the bus drivers?

I get unenrolled students any time I close a school... and sometimes the zombie disaster. Some ppl have said to delete all schools (and school bus stops) once you get a university, and unis do appear to teach students of all ages... if they're not too dumb to find their way to school in the first place, which a lot of sims are. Some can't even find their way to school with a school bus stop on their doorstep, and 2 schools equidistant.

The tower schools are economic and work... but only have 5 buses, which can't possibly serve the rest of the city, so you have to have multiple units spaced around, to keep your sims educated enough to afford safety services for them... Just a university is enough to keep tech level up, but not sim health and happiness, it seems.

[SockoJr53 51]

That sounds like a TON of schools! I have a city of 150,000 right now, with one high school and one University at level 3 and they fulfill the education need. School bus stops are placed around one half the city, busing students to the high school, and university students either drive or take bus/streetcar to their classes.

 

I've never had issues with Sims complaining about not having schooling, maybe post a screenshot of your city with the education overlay on so we can see?

[Bacons 0]

Since you have a processor factory, I suggest you should destroy everything except the university. Grade schools and high schools take in your uneducated and give them education levels, however they will not output into the knowledge network which your factory and processor factory needs. In fact, you should never run a grade school or a high school in any city unless you have horrible traffic problem.