Minimize space requirements for water pumps in SimCity 3000

Contributor/author(s): James Salmon

This is a pretty easy way to minimize the amount of space your water pumps take up in relation to the amount of water you actually get. It also gives you more freedom as to where you put them, making it easier to spread them around the city.

Step 1: Use the Add Water tool from the landscaping menu to add a single square of water to your land, preferably in a good-sized, flat area. You should now have a 3X3 square with one square of water in the middle. Keep in mind that all nine squares count as fresh water, however.

Step 2: Use the Level Terrain tool, also from the landscaping menu, on one of the middle outside squares of the 3X3 squares (NOT, however, on the middle square with the actual water). You should now have a 2X3 section with a thin blue line of water in the middle. Now use the Level Terrain tool on one of the corners, which should leave you with a 2X2 square with a tiny diamond of fresh water in the middle- but again, all four of those squares count as being fresh water.

Step 3: Simply put down water pumps all around the remaining 2X2 section. You should now have a 4X4 section of water pumps, each of which will provide you with its full capacity of water- for a total of 18,000 m3 of water, for a very small investment of space. Connect it to your pipe system, and you're ready to go.

This is mostly useful for mayors with little or no water in their cities, but the biggest advantage I've gotten from it is that with all your pumps in easily located areas, it's a great deal easier to find them when it's time to replace them.

See also
Coastal water pump configuration is efficient
Keep track of your water pumps