Euro-Style Regional Transport Plan: Best Backbone / Eternal Commuters?

[adventurerneil 29]

Greetings from snowy Colorado, everyone!

I'm designing my first region-wide Transportation Master Plan™, so that I later have something to kick myself for / regret every step of the way! 

I have NAM 35 and my TSCT is set to European (high) usage of transit, so my sims will actually, you know, walk a mile (unlike certain *cough* California-centric vanilla lazybones sims). I'm on Eaton region (I'll post a pic further down), and I'm anticipating very high density near the water, slowly petering out to medium and low density as you move West, maybe akin to a Chicago type region in terms of density / land value.

My goals are to: push myself to learn more about NAM, develop something that is functional and cost-efficient, and to develop something that is aesthetically pleasing / not OVERLY grid-y (without pouring TOO many extra hours down the drain for looks). 

I'm wondering:

1) Is it a good idea to do transportation top-down like this, or should I let the cities and transit evolve more organically as I develop each city? (in theory that sounds most realistic, but in practice I'd rather hammer down a skeleton that at least serves each area minimally and then later build onto it, rather than have to go back and demolish and re-envision a lot with existing infrastructure. Don't want any eminent domain riots!)

2) What types of transit would you plan most centrally for a region of 10-50 million sims? I'm thinking heavy rail and RHW will form the bulk of my inter-regional connections, with some monorail connecting posh areas, and subways in the CBD's. 

3) Do eternal commuters only apply to one type of transit at a time? For example, if I plan a RHW system that follows the tree structure, but have another type of transit that completes a loop (with the RHW), it wouldn't matter because they'd have to be transferring / parking to complete said loop, right? 

So far I have a rough sketch of what a possible RHW / rail / monorail network could look like. Let me know if I have set it up correctly to prevent eternal commuters (the squares are outlining the tiles I believe will be the most dense, but don't cross any regional borders): 

Cheers and thanks in advance for any input! 

[rsc204 21,804]

Eternal commuters can be a problem, regardless of the number and types of networks used. A bit of careful planning can avoid problems for the most part however. Just try to ensure that sims aren't able to get back to where they started from if they leave a city tile. If you are going for realism, this can be awkward sometimes, but there are plenty of tips and information out there for avoiding the issue.

6 hours ago, adventurerneil said:

Is it a good idea to do transportation top-down like this, or should I let the cities and transit evolve more organically as I develop each city?

It's certainly one way of playing and the way I tend to build. Having a network hierarchy will allow you to avoid problems too. So for example I tend to get the major rail/highways in first, because there are some limitations when it comes to crossing these with other networks, especially with RHW.

7 hours ago, adventurerneil said:

What types of transit would you plan most centrally for a region of 10-50 million sims?

What is in a number? 10-50m sims is a lofty goal for SC4, even over a very large region. It's not in any way impossible to do, but if your real goal is a recreation of an area, who cares how many sims live there? For example, a house in SC4 may have 40 occupants, it's not been based on real-world stats. Instead, the numbers are balanced to provide the simulation with what it needs to represent the various levels of growth. If you do away with worrying about the number of sims, concentrating instead on getting things to look right, you'll probably build nicer more natural cities as a result.

Monorail is great for intra-city travel as it's a fast and direct network. Highways can work this way too. Regular rail is slower and works better if you have a few stops in most cities. If this is your first time building though, there is a learning curve to get the most out of the various transport networks. Each will have capacity limits too, so you have to be careful to ensure you have sufficient transport infrastructure to cover the number of sims and the places they need to travel between.

It looks like you are fairly new to playing SC4? If that's the case, the one tip I would give you is to take things slowly. You'd probably benefit a lot from making a few regions to get an handle on the game, before you start such a huge project. Some playing around with regions will help you to better understand what is and what isn't possible. Not to mention give you a sense of how to balance the games needs to keep growth healthy along the way. You might also find my NAM Tutorials (link in sig) on YouTube help you to get started with some of the basic NAM features. It's a very large and complex mod, so again having a clear idea of what you can do with it will ultimately help you with your goals here.

[jeffryfisher 2,176]

Eternal commuters could be more of a problem where sims can change transport networks (because, according to what I've read in these forums, they then forget where they came from and can go right back).

[twalsh102 1,601]

While your current planned layout will certainly prevent any eternal commuter loops from occurring, you are also limiting yourself in terms of expansion opportunities. 

The first part of preventing eternal commuter is understanding the causes.

It all comes down to what are the available jobs, and where are they located in relation to any existing neighbor connections to another existing city.  The type of connection doesn't matter as long as it provides a means to allow commuters to pass.  The types of connections used between cities don't apparently have to be the same to complete the "loop." 

For a Sim, it's essentially all about the quickest route to a job that matches that Sim's wealth level.  So (for example we'll use a R$$ Sim), It doesn't matter that there is a new building offering hundreds of CO$$ 10 tiles away, if there is a dirt road neighbor connection that's only 6 tiles away,  the Sim will always take that neighbor connection.  Distance of available jobs (in the adjacent city) from the "entry point" into that adjacent city are not taken into consideration when making a decision between taking a "local" job or commuting to an adjacent city.  Note that the "mode of transportation" and/or type of network, will determine the effective "entry point."  If the mode of transportation is some means of public transportation (bus, subway, HSR, passenger rail, etc.), the effective "entry point" will be the first station of that type the Sim hits.  If by car, I think it will depend on whether the roadway is limited access or not (i.e. I think the pathfinding is sophisticated enough to know that a Sim can't make his car jump over the retaining wall on an elevated highway to get to a nearby neighbor connection vs. hitting the first occurring interchange/off-ramp and starting the job search from there).  If a Sim is walking, the "entry point" is obviously the tile on the other side of the neighbor connection 

Once that Sim magically appears in the adjacent city, he starts his job search again, again looking for the closer of a job of his wealth level, or another neighbor connection to a different adjacent city (eternal commuters never occur between just two adjacent cities - it must involve at least three).  If an available neighbor connection to a third city is closer than available jobs, that Sim will make the jump to the third city.  If this third city happens to be the original city for this Sim, then the loop is complete and an eternal commuter has been created. 

There are probably some other factors that also come into play, but I think this is the gist of it.

From everything I can find, once an eternal commuter has been created, it doesn't go away.

BTW, part of the beauty of this game is that in general, there really is no right or wrong way to play it.  As you read through posts, you will definitely find that there are things that will make your city building endeavor easier or more difficult.  So whether to plan your entire transportation network beforehand, or "let the cities and transit evolve more organically as I develop each city" is really a personal choice based on your goals for a particular city/region, and your play style as it develops.  Don't be afraid to experiment.  Don't be afraid of failure (such a determination of failure will most likely only be in your mind) (I seriously doubt there is anybody that has played this game since it was created, that was able to successfully navigate all the potential minefields in their very first city.

There are no victory conditions.  There are no real objectives to meet (except those you determine for yourself).  You get to determine what qualifies as a success or a failure, and it is such only in your mind.  You will be your own harshest critic.  I don't think I've ever run across a post along the lines of "Dude, you really screwed the pooch on this one.  I think you need to just blow whole thing up and start from scratch." 

[adventurerneil 29]

Thanks again, everyone, for the good guidance. Much appreciated, and it's being incorporated! :-) 

It sounds like one means of preventing eternal commuters is to make sure there's a variety of different job wealth levels scattered throughout town. It also sounds like I should be cautious / intentional before creating an abundance of neighbor connections, especially near residential areas. (Maybe even going so far as to have only 1 neighbor connection per city while I do initial build-out / build-up, and then going back to make connections in once jobs are in place more locally.)

Cheers! 

[twalsh102 1,601]

Sounds like you have the idea, except for that last part: "going so far as to have only 1 neighbor connection per city while I do initial build-out / build-up." Adopting a "one size fits all" approach such as this could have unintended consequences.

The primary means of demand cap relief for both CO and Industrial is neighbor connections (NOTE:  airports and seaports count as neighbor connections).  Without neighbor connections, there are a limited number of buildings you can use to provide CAP relief, and most of these have at least one negative consequence for using them.  Without CAP relief, your commercial office and industrial areas will grow only to a certain point and then stagnate.

A little more about CAP relief:

For CO: each connection of a certain type (Hwy, subway, road, rail) provides a certain amount of CAP relief.  You can have multiples of the same type of connection to the same neighbor city, but after the first, each succeeding connection of the same type provides a diminishing amount of CAP relief.

For Industrial:  It's all about the number of freight trips.  Every industrial building sends out a number of freight shipments each month.  For every successful shipment (i.e. arrival at a neighbor connection that allows the passage of freight), CAP is raised by 20.  However, like commutes to jobs, freight trips also have maximum time allowances.  If a freight trip must cross an entire city square to reach the only neighbor connection, you run the risk of having that freight trip fail.  Failed freight trip = no CAP relief!

So, you're sort of stuck with a bit of a conundrum:  you want to be cautious about the number and placement of neighbor connections to avoid the eternal commuter bug.  But you have to have neighbor connections in order to provide CAP relief so your city will grow.

There is a trick here though.  For the purposes of CAP relief, a neighbor connection does not have to actually be connected to anything on the other side of the connection.  You just need to be conscious of this when working along the borders areas of that neighbor city, because creating a neighbor connection will create a stub on the other side.

Of course, once you start playing that neighbor city, this may cause some aesthetic issues for you.  But, as one quickly learns, this game is all about tradeoffs. 

[adventurerneil 29]

Wow, great info, and much detail - thank you @twalsh102! 

Just to clarify a quick thing or two - when a sim reaches a neighbor connection, they magically appear in the next city (and are presumably able to look for work there), regardless of whether the ACTUAL neighbor connector is linked up to any network? (Stubs that are unattached are only aesthetically problematic?) 

Also, when you say CO, do you mean specifically commercial office demand, or commercial demand in general? 

[CorinaMarie 29,556]

3 hours ago, adventurerneil said:

Also, when you say CO, do you mean specifically commercial office demand, or commercial demand in general?

It does mean Commercial Office specifically. Commercial Service isn't limited by Demand Caps. And the diminishing returns Tim mentioned for CO are as follows:

Highway (1st, 2nd & 3rd connections)

1. 100,000
2. 58,496
3. 41,504

Subway

1. 20,000
2. 11,699
3. 8,301

Road

1. 10,000
2. 5,850
3. 4,150

Rail

1. 10,000
2. 5,850
3. 4,150

[twalsh102 1,601]

10 hours ago, adventurerneil said:

Just to clarify a quick thing or two - when a sim reaches a neighbor connection, they magically appear in the next city (and are presumably able to look for work there), regardless of whether the ACTUAL neighbor connector is linked up to any network? (Stubs that are unattached are only aesthetically problematic?) 

Not quite.  For the purposes of this discussion, consider there to be two different types of neighbor connection (there are actually two, but not broken down as I'm breaking them down).  One used for the purpose of CAP relief as we've been discussing, and the normal one that allows commuter traffic to move between city tiles.  The "normal" neighbor connection is connected to a network on both sides of the connection.  Sims that commute over the "normal" neighbor connection continue looking for jobs once reaching the other side.  The game will not pass commuter traffic over a neighbor connection that is not connected to a network on both sides of the connection. 

The neighbor connection trick as discussed in my previous post creates a connection that is only functional as far as providing Demand CAP relief.  Don't equate CAP relief with traffic. 

Once freight traffic hits a neighbor connection, it effectively disappears.  It doesn't actually go anyplace on the other side, whether it is connected to a network or not (i.e. you won't see trucks or freight trains actually rolling up to the local Home Depot or Walmart to offload merchandise created in a neighbor city).

The CO Cap Relief is just numbers added to raise the CAP.  It doesn't relate to any traffic actually passing through a neighbor connection. 

The stubs are only aesthetically problematic as long as you don't accidently connect any of those stubs to any networks.  The stubs are aesthetically problematic in that you will end up with stubs that don't go anywhere / do anything (at least not until you decide you want to complete a neighbor connection in a particular spot by connecting the stub to an existing network).  The stubs are effectively just a disconnected tile of pavement or rail (depending on the type of connection).

Hope that clarifies things.

Tim

[f3cs 1,063]

Looks like we want to do something similar. I already did some work, but I'm not 30% of developing the total of the possibilities. When I first build the region until It was CJ able, I did 2 subway lines (1 and 2) and 4 commuter railways (A,B,C,D). Now I'm thinking about a third subway line, that will be fully documented in the Bellingham Journal.

The point is, you don't need to have a full plan, or even follow it when you're actually building the city. As @rsc204 said, you don't need to focus in numbers, but how city looks. My city center looks dense but have just 111000 sims. The side neighbor has 774000 and doesn't look as dense as the city center, the city is growing kinda how it wants, and it looks nice.