Cagayan de Oro - 13. San Lorenzo - The Other Island

[Turjan 1,048]

Contents

1. Prologue (this post)

2. Water Shenanigans

3. Welcome to Cagayan

4. Central Station District

5. Druzhba - Friendship, or a Roof over your Head

Thought of the Day: Changing Things up

6. Plaza Mayor - The City's Parlor

7. Santa Catarina - Of Winners Past and Present

Thought of the Day: Square Pegs and Round Holes

8. The Last Run of Green Line

Thought of the Day: What If...

9. Luz del Norte - Suburban Dreams

Thought of the Day: Airport - What to do with it?

10. The Harbor - Connection to the World

11. A New Sunrise - Times of Change

12. 12: It's raining...

13. San Lorenzo - The Other Island

Edit: The respective last link on a page never works with Firefox, so if you use that and end up at the end of a page, please scroll up. Chrome works fine.

_________________________________________________________________
Welcome to Cagayan de Oro, my attempt at a Cities: Skylines city journal. Blame David (dedgren) for this. While I'm not making anything for this game, unlike the many very creative people who have gathered on this site, I can at least follow his plea to try a little bit more of a contribution to the site. This CJ will give some glimpse into what I'm playing at the moment. It won't be any recreation of a real place (my apologies to people from Cagayan de Oro: I just stole the name). I'm also a very slow player, so don't expect this to move at any fast pace. And as, though I'm slow, I like to experience the whole enchillada,  this will be an eclectic effort. The backstory will sound somewhat forced and not follow any real place, but I hope it makes at least some sense, in an alternative possibility way.
As I didn't even make the map myself, I guess it's time to start just there.

Prologue
I was looking throught he workshop for a new map to try out, and I stumbled on the original version of the Karayan Valley (http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=545837560) map by Vexcarius. I think the map deserves some exposition. If you read his description, you will see that he had the Cagayan province in the northern Philippines as a base. As the word "Karayan" (literally "river") has, in my life, a connotation of an old, frail man leaning on a conductor's stand, I chose to adopt the Cagayan name. However, I added the "de Oro", which is actually the name of a city on Mindanao, but hey, it sounded good . The map contains some real life geo data, particularly from the town Tagaytay, a popular trip destination south of Manila.

The map is, in principle, a view of a river valley with some high plateau in the southeast.

 

Spoiler

This here is the original plateau part, with the rail line at the left marking the 25-tile border.

It looks a bit bland at the moment, but that's actually an advantage.
As a main draw of the map, this view of a rapid river from the central island was advertised.

However, when I looked at it, I saw lots of MW . Dont you see it, too?

No? But there's another rapid river a little bit further upstream from the main river:

This looked like the perfect spot for some incinerators to me.
In a few select spots, the map creator put a considerable effort into making the map look nice:


The main river itself is also quite scenic:

There's a beach area:

And this site seems predestined for a harbor:

What actually caught my imagination were many of the spots that looked a bit rough on the map:


This looked to me like river systems that just waited for being switched on. But that's something we will look at next time.

We will see progress. We won't stop until we see lots of concrete, and all that greenery being paved over . Well, maybe not all, but the direction is clear.
In line with this philosophy, literally the first thing I built on this map was this:

Nearly 1,500 MW . That will last a while. There is some defiance:

But we will get you all. Resistance is futile.

 

_______________________________________________________

So far for today. I tend to rebuild parts of the city when I get the whim, so it may not all be a straight progression. However, as an indicator that this CJ is not poised to die immediately, here is a hint at one of the possible futures:

Take this as a promise.

[dedgren 830]

Way too many hours have gone by, my friend, without a first comment.  I had cataract surgery today so I'm just getting on the computer and, whoa... Cagayan de Oro!  You've got a great start- I love the "badlands" eroded terrain in a couple of the pics.  My vision will clear up over the next few days and I'm sure I'll be seeing more stuff to like.  Good luck!

 

David

[TekindusT 3,809]

When saw the name I inmediately thought that @jmsepe had started a CJ!

[Turjan 1,048]

@David: Wow, you are a trooper. The last thing I would think of after cataract surgery would be commenting on a fledgling city journal of which you don't even know yet whether it's going to be any good. Thanks for the good wishes!

@TekindusT: I'm afraid this will be a horrible disappointment for jmsepe. It's the wrong Cagayan, and then again, it's generally a sham package as there is hardly anything suited to model that area on the workshop. There isn't even much Spanish colonial stuff there. Which means that this CJ won't have any semblance to the real thing or even the real Philippines at all. It will be a hodgepodge of things that don't belong in that area. I hope it works somehow anyway.

[Horus_Kol 118]

Nice start. I like your humour.

That's a pretty good range of terrain there - and one huge dam!

Looking forward to following this journal

[TekindusT 3,809]

@TekindusT: I'm afraid this will be a horrible disappointment for jmsepe. It's the wrong Cagayan, and then again, it's generally a sham package as there is hardly anything suited to model that area on the workshop. There isn't even much Spanish colonial stuff there. Which means that this CJ won't have any semblance to the real thing or even the real Philippines at all. It will be a hodgepodge of things that don't belong in that area. I hope it works somehow anyway.

Sure it will. After all, Toledo, Ohio doesn't look much like Toledo, Spain; even though they share the same name .

[Turjan 1,048]

@Horus_Kol: The good range of terrain is indeed a bit of a challenge here. There is not much space on the side where the dam is -it's very close to the border of the 25 tiles - but the range on the left has to be climbed.
@TekindusT: True. After all I decided to do it this way. My remarks were rather preemptive. There's a sbuilt-up avegame on the workshop with the title of "Jena", and you can see all the disappointed comments by people from Jena underneath.

__________________________________________

Entry 2: Water ShenanigansToday, I will talk a bit about the beginning, when I fooled around with water sources on this map. In the first image, you see lots of these badlands-like terrain features, and I thought of reactivating some of these.

Spoiler

 

I started in the southeast with some sources at the rim of the plateau.

The idea is that this is a wet plateau, and much of the water seeps through the somewhat porous rock, so I get away with this. I'm not quite settled yet on how to decorate the actual sources. I like how the game changes the textures in the little pools that form to sand

The edge of this new creek was well formed, and I did not have to do anything to model the banks.

However, I had to dredge out the mouth of it, probably because the map creator enhanced the banks of his original river arm.

 

I quite like the water tools, here as an example near the designated harbor area. When I placed the water sources, I mostly used a strength of 0.01, with a few exceptions.

Some of the bigger ones were meant as potential places for water pumps. You will see that this was not how it worked out. I really love how you can change the maximum pump height of these sources.

In the east, I placed this creek and lake system, which is the most difficult regarding water management.

The shores are quite low, so it's a bit tricky to get the right size of the water sources, and I later had to adjust them when I placed water pumps at the lake.

I like the look of those shallow pools. On the elevation contour map, you can see what happens when this lake pours over: the water will run down all the way to the sea.

As the big dam basically took away what was advertised as one of the most scenic spots on the map, I placed a new waterfall right next to it.

I can make it more impressive, but that leads to flooding issues.

 

Overall, this first stage of "making the map wet" led to this situation:

I actually added more water later, when the pumps were finally working, but I think it's enough of this for now. Let's finally go to the city itself after all of the wet stuff.

The second building I placed on the map was actually a church. I waited for a sunrise to get the orientation of the church right. This also proved useful as a marker for the cardinal directions on the map.

So, I hope you were able to enjoy some of this.

[dedgren 830]

Water, water, everywhere!  

I have found the water tools to be immensely frustrating.  It would be a great area for some modder to come along and make a mark.  We need steadier flows, more predictable flow "downhill," those sorts of things.  That said, the hydrology aspect of C:S is a fascinating aspect of the game and it's fun to watch you play with it.

That church pic is incredible.

 

David

[Turjan 1,048]

 Thanks David.

I have found the water tools to be immensely frustrating.  It would be a great area for some modder to come along and make a mark.  We need steadier flows, more predictable flow "downhill," those sorts of things.

I can see this with your map. I guess the Kentucky river has only some very slight height difference from one side of the map to the other, and as both sides of your map are open, the water will try to run backwards out of your map. On the map that I use, all the big rivers have a blunt end that is hidden from view away from the main play area. Also, all the slopes are quite steep. While the main valley ground looks relatively flat in the height map, the river still has a considerable grade, which results in rather high banks near the mouth. In principle, this map plays to the advantages of the game's water system.

[Roadman20 601]

I have to admit the water feature in C:S is by far one of the most entertaining things to work with in the game.  Obviously, somewhat frustrating as others have noted, but nevertheless, it's a delight to see functioning water physics in a city simulator.  The region looks great so far.

[FullStrenght 74]

The region looks great so far.

Couldn't agree more, this all looks very promising, including the church picture in particular!

[Turjan 1,048]

Thank you very much for your comments, Roadman20 and FullStrenght. I hope I won't disappoint. I guess it's time to post something again.

Entry 3: Welcome to Cagayan

The Old Town of Cagayan is situated on an island, aptly named Isla de Cagayan. Near the end of the 19th century, a large railway terminal was setup just north of the center, directly on the new main boulevard that was constructed through most of the old town, the Avenida Real. Compared to the size of Cagayan during those years, it was a bit too grand, expecting visitors from the inland that didn't live there yet. It fell in disrepair over the years, and you could listen to the sound of crickets most of the time, with altogether three steam trains arriving per day from the villages up the river. However, during the last three decades, four new local lines serving intra-city traffic of Cagayan de Oro have been opened, and today it's one of the busiest stations of all Cagayan de Oro, despite the old town having been somewhat sidelined since.

Some trains from the inland still go here, even if most trains go to downtown nowadays. When they approach the city, they pass by some of the oldest buildings of old town.

Directly around the curve, they enter the terminal hall.

As you can see, the local platforms on the left and the right are busier than intercity traffic. However, there are still enough people arriving here that the station is still served by regional and intercity trains.

In some circles, Cagayan bears the nickname "City of the Dead". Nobody knows exactly where this originated, but this may well be due to the statue of the Angel of Death greeting each visitor who steps out of the terminal, which seems like an odd choice.

Another reason may be that you see hearses everywhere. It's a stark reminder of our final destination.

Just make sure you don't book this with your ticket when you visit the city.

Life is pulsating nevertheless, and this part of town is bustling with pedestrians.

Some people on the city council like to point out that the bus service in this part of the city is simply atrocious. Most people have to walk if they want to get to their destination.

In turn, the councilor for public transport won't hesitate to stress that the state of public transport in the city is a valuable contribution to public health, as walking is a very invigorating activity. The opposition is not convinced though. Instead of having trees next to the station, a transport hub would be preferable. However, people in the center got used to the greenery, so this solution is not very popular, either.

Anyway, walking isn't the worst solution for old town, and many people still go there even at night.

There's much to see in the city.

Welcome to Cagayan!

[Roadman20 601]

Got to the fourth picture and just cracked up with the quasi-1950-60's South American vibe with the buses and the hearse in front of the train station.  It's a fantastic part of town btw. 

[dedgren 830]

Unique look...check.

Sense of humor...check.

Great originality...check!

Welcome to Cagayan!

 

David

[Vals Loeder 27]

Great pictures, especially for a railway enthusiast like me.

[FullStrenght 74]

Wow, great update! I like it a lot! I had no idea you could actually enter the railway station! I think I have it in one of my cities, I should go check haha  Anyway, great attention to detail, I love to see more!

[Turjan 1,048]

On 12/15/2015 at 3:20 AM, Roadman20 said:

Got to the fourth picture and just cracked up with the quasi-1950-60's South American vibe with the buses and the hearse in front of the train station.  It's a fantastic part of town btw. 

Good to know I got the atmosphere just about right, thank you. Of course, this wouldn't work without Zed68's wonderful Cadillac hearse. By the way, the buses are some of the newer models .

On 12/15/2015 at 5:48 AM, dedgren said:

Unique look...check.

Sense of humor...check.

Great originality...check!

Welcome to Cagayan!

Thank you for the encouraging words. I hope I can keep this up.

On 12/15/2015 at 8:15 PM, Vals Loeder said:

Great pictures, especially for a railway enthusiast like me.

This game is really a treat for rail enthusiasts, at least more so than other city builders. Thanks.

On 12/16/2015 at 10:14 AM, FullStrenght said:

Wow, great update! I like it a lot! I had no idea you could actually enter the railway station! I think I have it in one of my cities, I should go check haha  Anyway, great attention to detail, I love to see more!

Heh, thanks. You can use any "free camera" mod to do that. The next update will come soon, probably tomorrow.

[Turjan 1,048]

Entry 4: Central Station District
Today we will go on a short walk around the area in the NW of Cagayan Central Station that we had visited last time already. This area was the original location of the oldest harbor of Cagayan, which unfortunately left no trace, and is today dominated by the old university and the Belvedere, the former house of the Spanish governors. It is also an area of nightlife and a location of quiet residences, as quiet as residences can be around a lot of students who like to party.
Here we see an overview of the area:

One of the main focal points of the area is the plaza around the Columna de la Victoria, the Victory Column, where the road from the main bridge to the district of San Lorenzo meets the Avenida Real.

The citizens of Cagayan have a less respectful nickname for the column, the Challenge Cup, due to its changeful  history. When the building was started, the column was supposed to celebrate the final victory of the Spaniards against the people in the inner mainland, after more than 300 years of fierce struggles. However, just 6 years later, Spain was defeated by the USA,  and the land saw some short, turbulent years of independence. Building proceeded, now as monument of the independence, but it was only finished after the American government took control of the area. Thus it was inaugurated to celebrate the victory against its original commissioners. After renewed independence it got into danger as symbol of colonialism, but it was decided to call it Ángel de la Independencia, which saved it from destruction. It once again got into peril after the revolution, where it was seen as a sign of bourgeois decadence. However, as the mayor of the time liked to say, "Even if we lose, we somehow always win". There was a short moment, where the question rose what loss during the revolution the mayor referred to and whether this would win the mayor a ticket to the new educational facilities the revolutionary government had opened in the jungle. However, this also passed, and the Victory Column still stands, again referred to by its original name. It has been remodeled since.

Next to the bridge to San Lorenzo, we see the site of the oldest harbor. There's nothing left, other than some of the oldest buildings in town, still in the Dutch style, and a river wall, which often sees anglers at dawn or dusk.

There are other, older buildings close by that also withstood destruction during the many floods and fires the city had seen, like the buildings that line the railway tracks up the river. Citizens and tourists alike love to visit the small stores on the ground floor.

One block from the railway station, you find the main church of the area, with the name of Santa Cruz.

From there, you can take quiet back alleys to the university building.

The university itself is situated at a large plaza with gardens.

From the steps in front of the university, a path leads to the Belvedere, the former house of the Spanish governors.

Both, university and Belvedere, lie embedded in the same park. The Belvedere building itself houses art exhibitions on its ground floor and contains some renovated historical rooms on the upper floor. The building also saw lots of changes during its life. During the revolutionary years, it housed the "culture association" of the Communist Party. In reality, it saw basically one party after the other. The ground floor had been emptied, with most of the historical remnants moved to the upper floor that served - other purposes. As the Soviet consul to the city once said "Our comrades in Cagayan must have gotten the wrong impression when they looked up "party" in the dictionary".

The arrangement proved useful during the big tsunami of 1975, which destroyed much of the lower areas of Cagayan. However, the upper floor of the Belvedere survived unscathed, and with it everything stored there. The party members who celebrated the opening of an elementary school somewhere near the city at the time, had a nice view on the destruction from the patio on the second floor. If they had stayed that is, as they were, of course, preferentially evacuated.

While the party times in the Belvedere are over nowadays, the area itself still parties on. The houses directly in front of Central Station were never rebuilt, and the area saw some pubs spring up. Most of them have been replaced by some larger buildings since, but it's still the place to go out on a night in the old town.

Much of it has to do with the waterfront here, which is generally referred to as "Pools". The area is shielded from the river current, and the water pools were popular bathing spots in historical times, though nowadays people tend to just go to the ocean beach. The waterfront is still popular for walks or riding your bicycle though.

So, I hope you got to know this area of Cagayan a little better.

[TekindusT 3,809]

Not a big fan of those buildings with very saturated colors, but definetely a fan of this square where the column stands!

[Turjan 1,048]

On 12/20/2015 at 1:48 PM, TekindusT said:

Not a big fan of those buildings with very saturated colors, but definetely a fan of this square where the column stands!

Thanks, and I can see that. I don't mind the saturated colors on the red roofs near the water or the bright colors of the facades of these houses from Gdansk, as this is sometimes done that way when very old houses get a facelift in a tourist town. However, there's no reason for that zoo of roof colors and patterns on the two rows of houses. The real houses have just different shades of red. Maybe, one day, I take a stab at boformer's texture replacer, if I feel adventurous.

My main problem was that there aren't any really old houses available on the workshop, and of the few, some have never been updated for AD. Also, my mom's born there, so I guess the houses will stay for the time being.

[boformer 3,169]

This is update is excellent! Your city looks so dense, and the vegetation is beautiful!

[dedgren 830]

If you are worried about "keeping up," my friend, with updates like that one it's us who need to be worried.

The "university steps" and dusk sidewalk shots are stunning.  The rest are merely fantastic.  The backstory is great, too.

 

David

[Elz_41 10]

Looking good! 

[Turjan 1,048]

If you are standing in a bus line in your tropical vacation paradise and are dreaming of a white Christmas, there's nothing a bit of fake snow won't be able to fix. Except for the heat.

I wish all of you Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year.

_______________________________________________________________________________________

Comments

On 12/22/2015 at 2:11 AM, boformer said:

This is update is excellent! Your city looks so dense, and the vegetation is beautiful!

Thank you for the kind words. I guess it's an advantage of the tropical setting that you can easily go overboard with the greenery.

On 12/22/2015 at 5:55 AM, dedgren said:

If you are worried about "keeping up," my friend, with updates like that one it's us who need to be worried.

The "university steps" and dusk sidewalk shots are stunning.  The rest are merely fantastic.  The backstory is great, too.

Thanks a lot. I guess you know how to motivate people . And I'm sure you won't have anything to worry about at all.

On 12/23/2015 at 3:35 PM, Elz_41 said:

Looking good! 

Thanks.

 

[jmsepe 2,038]

Nice work. Speaking of Cagayan de Oro. It is actually my hometown.

[Turjan 1,048]

12 hours ago, jmsepe said:

Nice work. Speaking of Cagayan de Oro. It is actually my hometown.

Yeah, that's what TekindusT already pointed at further above, and I'm afraid you won't recognize it . If I understood it correctly, your hometown only really started growing after 1960 or so, with less than 50k inhabitants after WWII, and must now be a mostly modern city with its current 600k inhabitants. Plus there are hardly any colonial influences in architecture, and the little that was there had been destroyed during WWII. So I guess this is a Cagayan from an alternative universe, with a different map layout, much earlier growth, some colonial influences in the architecture (just because this is what the game and modders deliver), and a mix of real and fake history. Plus poplars. Who doesn't like poplars (except street architects)? I'll probably make a background post at one point.

[Vals Loeder 27]

I really like the last update. The city really has that Central/South American feel about it. Well done!

[jmsepe 2,038]

2 hours ago, Turjan said:

Yeah, that's what TekindusT already pointed at further above, and I'm afraid you won't recognize it . If I understood it correctly, your hometown only really started growing after 1960 or so, with less than 50k inhabitants after WWII, and must now be a mostly modern city with its current 600k inhabitants. Plus there are hardly any colonial influences in architecture, and the little that was there had been destroyed during WWII. So I guess this is a Cagayan from an alternative universe, with a different map layout, much earlier growth, some colonial influences in the architecture (just because this is what the game and modders deliver), and a mix of real and fake history. Plus poplars. Who doesn't like poplars (except street architects)? I'll probably make a background post at one point.

Well, your version of Cagayan de Oro looks good but hey, there should be some space for tall buildings.

[Turjan 1,048]

On 12/25/2015 at 8:05 PM, jmsepe said:

Well, your version of Cagayan de Oro looks good but hey, there should be some space for tall buildings.

Patience . On the river island, the building code stands against this (with a few minor exceptions we will see later), but there's still the downtown area on the mainland.

On 12/25/2015 at 6:08 PM, Vals Loeder said:

I really like the last update. The city really has that Central/South American feel about it. Well done!

Thank you. I guess it will end up looking somewhat mixed.

Edit: Next update will hopefully come soon. So here just a little teaser image from the next area:

[Turjan 1,048]

Finally, here is the update.

Entry 5: Druzhba - Friendship, or a Roof over your Head
Dru.. what? If you struggle to pronounce that, you are in good company. Most people in Cagayan refer to this city quarter just as "Dru", and "Dru 1" or "Dru 2" if they want to get more specific. Druzhba means "Friendship" in most Slavic languages, and it is the name of a grand building project from after the big tsunami of 1975. The Soviet Union had a generous day and delivered buidling plans and a good chunk of money to get the project on the way, as a way to show their friendship to the people of Cagayan - or to keep the government of that day in the saddle, depending on your view. Later, there were a few attempts made to change the name, but there was nothing obvious found that could be shortened to "Dru", so the name stayed.
Druzhba directly connects in the NE to the Central Staion district.

The business district on the Avenida Real was more or less the only part of this city quarter that got restored and looks pretty much like the neighbor district.

Most of the surrounding area formed a dense patchwork of lower wooden buildings that had been severely damaged or simply swept away. The Druzhba project completely changed that area, however with one specific peculiarity that you notice immediately when you enter the area.

When the first part of the project, Dru 1 in the SE, was started, the government seized the whole area to build a modern mix of prefab blocks and surrounding lawn areas. Many landowners were unhappy with the offered compensation and went to court. Though the chances of the lawsuit were seen as slim, the surprising verdict was that the government had to return all lots that were not needed for buildings to their respective owners, because the huge homelessness after the tsunami was not the time to build parks. In the first years, this resulted in shanties between the newbuilt apartment blocks, but these were later rebuilt as a spillover from some Swedish building project in San Lorenzo, which led to the current mix of buildings.

Some small houses ended up in somewhat weird places. It is not known whether anyone ever sits at that table behind this terraced house.

While you may think nobody would want to live there, both parties are actually quite happy with the situation. The people in the prefab buildings have something else to look at than just other prefab buildings, and the people in the terraced houses like to send their children to the playgrounds of the bigger houses. This may explain why this turned out to be one of the most popular neighborhoods of the city. Some places even look quite bucolic (don't mind the common Cagayan Land Jellyfish in the pic).

Dru 1 also got a newbuilt local train line that comes out of a tunnel under the old town and connects this area directly to Cagayan Central and the northern industry area.

Cagayan Druzhba Station is situated near the tip of Isla de Cagayan, where many bridges connect the island to other parts of the city.

The station connects Brickham Line to the local bus service and is always busy, with the old  intercity tracks in the foreground.

In the distance, this view from the eastern bridge to San Lorenzo shows the huge concrete pillar that supports Cagayan Druzhba Station in the center of the road where the turning lanes start.

Near the western bridge to San Lorenzo, the university built its swim stadium. As during the time when it was built swimming in the "Pools" area of Cagayan (we went there last time) left lasting impressions on your complexion due to the industry further upstream, this was also opened to the public and became quite popular.

A few years later, Druzhba 2 was finally started. People complained once more, but the judge from the first ruling had been replaced by someone else. The first judge had taken up an opportunity at one of the advanced training centers the government had opened in the jungle, and he must have liked that very much, as he stayed there till the end of his life. There were also some very vocal holdouts in two of the buildings. But this also got a happy end, when these people had a sudden change of mind and took up some new opportunity somewhere in the central mainland. They even gifted their houses to the government without compensation, and their magnanimous deed is commemorated by a plaque on the buildings. As a result, Dru 2 turned out to be more uniform.

As the mayor of that time said during the inauguration festivities, this new city quarter represents the clarity of the socialist vision, and who would disagree with that, especially during those times?

However, there's a large beach park on one side of the complex, and a fishing pier in the "Pools" area on the other side.

Of course, no citizen of Cagayan would be caught fishing without the proper attire.

 

I hope you enjoyed this small excursion in the city of Cagayan.