Can someone explain buildings "upgrading"?

[Fearlessmayor 44]

I hope you all are well! so, I've been playing the game for about a month, and 40 hours in total and recently one of my first CSL maps reached 70,000 in population.  With that I noticed some of my beautiful residential high rise buildings automatically replaced with new buildings.  which was a bit of a put-off for me at first since I really liked the buildings in that residential district I developed.  I looked closer, and they seem fine, they don't in any way detract from the beauty of that part of town, they look just as nice as the original buildings, albiet different. some of my low density housing neighborhoods did the same thing.  my houses upgraded and changed style. I noticed my high density commercial buildings followed. I assume they upgraded themselves too. however I didn't notice a huge difference in style.  from the beginning I've never like the neon billboards on the HD commercial high rises.  I don't mind a few, but when it's every other building, it's become a huge pet peeve of mine.  it ruins the look of my commerical districts so my question is, what can I expect as far as the "upgrading" of buildings? since the game doesn't have a "change building style" menu like SC4 did, I don't know what will happen. I only use the Boreal and Temperate themes -- I'm not a fan of tropical or european, which is fine.  I'm quite happy with the boreal and temperate!  is there a particular style my resi and comm bldgs will change to after they've "upgraded?" is there a picture I can see of the style differences? does this mean my buildings will entirely change looks, will one or two things change on the buildings? will the "upgraded" buildings have fewer neon billboards? I would like to get a heads up from you guys, as it will help when I plan my cities. any of you who have cities in the 100,000 population or above I'd love to hear what you've noticed about this.  thanks so much!!

  Edited September 4, 2015 by Fearlessmayor  

[boformer 3,169]

On upgrade, buildings will be replaced with a different model. You will clearly see the difference between Level 1 and Level 5 buildings.

Residential buildings will upgrade when service coverage and education level are high enough.

You can use the "Control Building LevelUp" mod to disable upgrading for certain districts or single buildings.

A "downgrade" to level 1 only occurs when the buildings are abandoned.

[Fearlessmayor 44]

thanks @boformer. since there are 5 levels, will all buildings scale up 5 times?

thanks again for your input!!

[Cool_Z 1,547]

thanks @boformer. since there are 5 levels, will all buildings scale up 5 times?

thanks again for your input!!

That's one of the things that lack realism in CSL i think.

 

Yes, buildings have to go from level 1 to level 5, no level 5 building can grow from nothing.