Unassigned

OMG, I code for a living and I try to never say anything like that. Famous last words etc...

Clip2Pic from the LEX (free registration required) was made for taking JPG screenshots from within SC4 (but can also be used in other contexts). Once you set it up to your liking, it will save automagically, so you can take serial screenshots. Don't forget to get the MSVCP71.DLL if you haven't got it already, follow the link on the Clip2Pic page.

That's indeed a help, thank you drunkapple!

Thanks to everyone who commented and suggested things to try. For the record, here's what I tried and what effects it had. Taking out the mods which could possibly affect height didn't change anything - no Diagonal Bridges or ditto controller were installed, what was taken out was somewhat far-fetched: Ennedi's Slope Mod (medium), the and the The map (it's Izidor44's map) came with a jpg image of the SC4M file. The way this image differed from what I saw in SC4 Terraformer suggested 'my' version was raised a bit relative to the uploader's. So I tried SC4T's global lowering tool but if I got rid of the dry riverbeds, large areas supposed to be land would be flooded. Playing with Scaling Factor in SC4T didn't seem to change anything. Luckily the compression feature helped, letting me get rid of most of the dry river. so it was feasible to fix the remainder by hand. The streams on this particular map are shallow and narrow anyway, so I doubt I'll get anything sailing there, but as stated in my OP, this water level issue seems to be a general thing for me, so I'll still be looking how to handle it right.

Often when rendering a region using terrain and water mods, the water level in rivers and streams is very low, with occasional patches of dry river bed. What's a good way to deal with this? I should like to use these waterways for traffic, e.g. water taxis.

Actually tram alias GLR is sort of reskinned el-rail (which is built-in transit), so perhaps my preference for trams is because I'm more familiar with trams than el irl. Also I find tram in roads or avenues aesthetically more pleasing than double-decker el over roads. There are even transitions available between tram and el tracks, so it's the same network, really.

Trams, also called Ground Light Rail (GLR), can be very useful in reducing congestion. Trams can run in the middle of avenues and also on roads and streets. The stations are custom content, though. I use tram-in-avenue as the main public transport option in city centres, works great for my cities, but then I never had any tile with more than say 160K inhabitants. Tram-in-avenue can be a pain to build, and there's an issue with placing stations and crashes, so be sure to save often when building this. Amsterdam (which is not a square-grid city) has a well functioning tram system, you might find inspiration by takin a look, eg. in Google Maps or ditto Earth.

Even if you break the loop at one place, the eternal commuters may not go away, in which case you need to start the map over to get rid of them.

smileymk's Realistic Cities for Dummies CJ at SC4D has a bunch of ideas (and discussions)concerning realism.

According to teh Huffington Post, EA has now lowered the price of SimCity games to $9.99 for a time and is also otherwise having fun with all this. Disclaimer: I am not involved in US politics, only posting this for the lulz.

Dirty Industry (I-D) may grow without water, or at least some I-D lots do.