Arlott Docks
Hi Friends,
Thank you for coming and taking a peek at my latest journal entry. The previous entry was the first tile developed in this region. I have decided to throw the Pacific Northwest trees to the curb (even though they're great and I like them a lot) in favour of the Arden Trees. I've also renounced the 'minty fresh' green of the Gobias Berner Oberland terrain for the 'organic pesto' green of the Sudden Valley terrain. I'm happy with both choices, although swapping the tree controllers did involve nuking all the trees and mmps in my previous tile before switching. I haven't had the heart to open that now sadly bald tile, and have instead decided to develop a nice little seaport nearby which will (in my imagination) create an industrial foothold in the region for the sprawling metropolis that I surely won't be able to resist building 3 tiles away.
Anyway.
1. These houses are posh, and overlook the edge of the port area, which must be loud and unpleasant. Still, the sea views seem to make up for it, as many of my high wealth sims have seemingly happily made a little community here. The little commercial building on the left of the block is one of my absolute favourites. It comes from a Japanese site and the query is blank (at least in my English language version). I always have to make it historical before it gets swallowed up by something else.
2. Another angle on the lovely little building on the corner, and a chance to show off the mmp seawall. These are really flexible where the coastline isn't quite flat, or isnt quite straight or whatever, that makes lotted seawalls look a bit strange. Whilst this stretch of coast is straight, you can use it in much more exotic situations, such as:
3. Just a little further around the bay, we see the reclaimed portland start to give way to the natural coastline. The homes nearby mean that the seawall is required. Dog walkers (and their dogs) enjoy a stroll along here with the cranes looming in the distance like giant monsters.
4. Some shots of the more built up areas, building little commercial high streets like this is always quite difficult. Some of the commercial bats here like the petrol (some say gas) station and the Sainsbury's Local next door to it are stage 1 and need to be instantly made historical, some take a fair while longer to grow, but personally I think they all look at home together.
5. This substation in the center of the image i plop everywhere, (mainly places where I am too lazy to lay powerlines) but I think it fits in beautifully in either a city center or a rural village. I'm going to investigate if the walls around it are props rather than part of the model, because they would make perfect, beautiful fillers for a bunch of situations.
6. The final shot of the town center. I don't know about anyone else, but there is a strong urge when playing SimCity to continue to zone everywhere, then to start zoning higher densities. I've tried to resist that and as a reward, some of these stage 1 homes have maintained their foothold here, just one street away from the high street. I think we all deserve a pat on the back for not chasing the medium-density dragon.
7. I'm really making an effort to try to integrate rail into this region but making the tracks look like part of the city, rather than disconnected from it somehow has always been difficult. Part of this is that if you want to use the wide RRW curves, then there are a lot of 'dead' tiles which cannot contain any zoning or plops. I'm trying to work with some of the great selection of fillers and mmps to sort of blend the rail network more with the city that it's a part of, hopefully there are one or two nice examples of that later on in this entry.
8. Again, resisting the urge to zone everywhere leads to a need to fill those tiles up. Here I've gone with an industrial lot ready for development. I had a scan through to see if I could find billboards advertising "Development Opportunity" or "Call +44 0800 777 666" or whatever, but I came up short, if anyone knows of something like that they'd be a great option as a buffer zone for all our industrial zones across Simnation. Please comment below with information!
9. The only reason for including this image was to celebrate the fact that I've actually got traffic using my RHW after what seems like years of trying! I feel just like @Haljackey! 
10. Since this is a port tile, here are some port pictures! @Tyberius06 made a great set a few years ago that I downloaded but never really used (shorelines are intimidating). I'm pretty sure all the seaport lots from this entry are his work, which is in itself a re-imagining of the PEG Seaport. There are just a ridiculous number of options and they have a rail link in many of them, which I've made an effort to integrate into my now sprawling rail network! Also shoutout @Bipin's substation again. 
11. More port, more industry, more rail. The truck props are great. Seeing the American style trucks with the long nose rather than the flat fronted cab (I'm sorry, I don't know the technical term) is a real novelty here in the UK, but my sims enjoy a mix of styles.
12. So @Simmer2's 'Aziz used cars' here shown next to the fire station is an amazing little commercial lot. Like my old friend the substation, this thing can exist literally anywhere from central London to rural Mozambique. I love how densely packed the cars on the lot are, it gives the tiny 2x2 an oversized energy.
13. more MMP / railway blending. I think sometimes the trick is giving everything a little more room, just a tile or so on each side, and then filling that tile with MMPs. If you're consistent with how you do it, it starts to look more natural to the eyes maybe. Here @mattb325's ridiculously beautiful cul-de-sac lots have chosen to grow right next to this noisy brewery, which I suppose has it's compensations, maybe the residents are bought-off with free samples?
14. Longshot of the brewery and the giant skyscraping social housing which chose to grow here when I was testing some little amendments I made to the original lots (just making the grass and concrete match my own). I couldn't bring myself to demolish them, and here they stand to this day. They would have an amazing view of the port for sure.
15. Trying to squeeze the wide rail curves in everywhere was not always easy! This picture features the only place where I outright gave up in trying to make it smooth, with a 'kink' in the left hand spur here. It could be that's why no trains ever use any of this painstaking laid rail, or it could be that this region has no other cities, and nowhere to commute from. Still, the train automata has been quite conspicuously absent so far!
16. MMP playground with much required fence between it and the highway. Much needed because, just to re-emphasise it: Traffic on the RHW! So no trains yet, but plenty of RHW use. 1/2 is not too bad. (Thinking about it like that, it is pretty bad).
17. Don't ask me why the person in the house on the bottom left is shouting "Show Toolbars" so loudly that we can here him up here in this helicopter, over the sound of the rotor blades. More rail / city blending, here with an attempt to take the city right up to the rails themselves at the bottom of the image, and an excuse to use the curved NAM station. Still no actual trains though 
18. Helloooo? a single commuter? Please?.... No? As you can tell, my penchant for fences, fillers and whatnot remains strong!
19. YES!
20. To finish, 2 overviews of the area, the first showing mainly the port. Today quite quiet because the Ever Given caused a massive traffic jam of 400M containerships, and now all the port workers and their families will starve because no ships, no pay.
Just kidding. All the workers get to go home early, and the owners of the port lose money. I mean, come on; this can't be a world with no losers at all.
21. The second showing mainly the town. I hope you enjoyed the entry.
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