Rochefort

Important note: This method can ONLY be used prior to development taking place. If you attempt to raise or lower land levels during an existing game you will destroy ALL development. The following method will enable you to produce sharp edged waterways to your city map prior to development. In the first example we will create a straight edged coastline. You will need smoncrie's hole digging lots in order to achieve the desired results. Go into God Mode either before establishing your city or after by clicking ctr+shift+alt at the same time as selecting God Mode and raise the level of the whole map by a single click only. Switch back to Mayor Mode and select the 26m monorail hole digging lot and lay down as many as you need in order to provide an area large enough to provide you with a workable area. It is not necessary to lay down the hole digging lots for the entire expanse you wish to create as you can easily expand your original selection by using single street or road tiles..or by using the Mayor Mode levelling tool for larger areas. I tend to use a combination of the two...levelling tool first and then tidy up the edges with road tiles. Once demolished and tidied up with road tiles, you will be left with an area of lowered terrain as below: Now, go back to God Mode again and lower the terrain one click. You will now have your first stretch of straight coastline and you will be able to check the depth of the water. As you can see, laying down a single 26m monorail (which is the deepest in the set) produces only a shallow water depth. If you want deeper water than this you must repeat the process and each hole digging lot will result in a different water depth. Here, I have used the 26 monorail lots twice in order to create a deep water coastline. Obviously this kind of coastline is unrealistic not only because of its absolute straight edge, but also because of the sharpness of the land edge. However it has many uses, some of which will be covered in due course. Now you have the basic concept of creating the coastline, we shall look at ways of using the method in your cities. In this first example I will create a level beach using the standard in-game beach lots. In order to reproduce this design you will need a slope mod. In this instance I am using the slope mod created by bones1, but other variations will work just as well. So first of all, create a straight coastline as below: Now, go into God Mode and raise the level of the map by one click. Once you have done this, draw a road on the first raised tile of the shoreline along its whole length. Next go back into Mayor Mode again and draw a road straight down from the raised to the lower level at each tile. Because you created a road on the upper tile, the slope will extrude giving us a "raised" descent to the lower level. If you do not draw the upper road first the slope will indent and push the upper level of your shoreline back. Repeat this for the whole length of your shoreline. Now go back into God Mode and lower the level of the whole map...incidentally it is not necessary to demolish the roads you have created as they will be destroyed when you lower the land level. You will now have a sloping shoreline. Add the in-game beach lots to your shoreline and you're done. You may feel that the slope of your beach is too high and if so, we can easily remedy this by lowering the level of the land for a few tiles back from the water's edge. Again, using smoncrie's hole digging lots (this time I have used the sunken version) lower an area of tiles from the first raised tile back inland. Remember, each hole digging lot will produce different results. Experiment to find the height you require. As you can see in this example, once you have lowered the terrain the land sits much closer to the water level. Once you are happy with the height of your shoreline, you can raise the land and create your slope using the road method described previously. The result is a shallower angle on the slope of the beach as you can see in the comparison image. So, thats the basics covered for your coastlines. Now, you can also use the same method for canals, rivers, harbours and ports. Lots included are by jeronij and marrast. And finally, if you have the imagination, lots of spare time and nothing else better to do, you can also go regional !!!

This very simple tutorial is designed to offer just one example of how you can add any transport route, in this instance rail, in such a manner as to enhance the realism and general aesthetics of your cities. To start, I have a small rural community with road transport only. My plan will be to run a single rail track west/east with a passenger station at the heart of the village. In order to add some shape and variation to the course of the track I will add a diagonal section, which will in turn require the re-routing of my main road in order to accommodate a rail bridge overpass. This is going to entail some destruction of developed farmland, but needs must. I will firstly demolish along the route of my track. Again, for visual reasons I am going to raise the terrain so as to have my rail run along an embankment. Using smoncrie's "lifter" lot, I will raise a small stretch of terrain. Using single road tiles I will expand the raised embankment all the way along the route of the track. For yet more visual realism I am going to add overhead electricity gantries produced by frogface (Railway Electrification mod). In order to do this I will raise every 5th/6th tile along the track. Now that doesn't look too nice, so I'm going to add a simple grass filler lot, in this case one produced by morifari as it has no park effect. To finish the embankment look I will add ploppable trees along the route to a) add realism & b) hide the dirt base of the gantries. Note: If you are skilled with the LE you may want to change the dirt texture for a grass one, but if not remember that trees can hide a multitude of sins !! Next we need to deal with the re-routing of the main road and the positioning of the station. The reason I will be re-routing the main road is that the NAM rail bridge puzzle pieces must be fitted on a straight section and not diagonal. I do not like small sections of straight rail or road cut into diagonals, as I do not believe they look realistic and I'll avoid it at all costs. The fate of the old main road is sealed and the northern section will be demolished to be replaced by a line of trees to separate the two farms. Again I have placed grass filler lots here for better visuals. The southern section is re-designed to add a few extra houses and again trees added to blend to the embankment. For the station I have demolished a small section of the large farm and the few houses along the new section of the main road (although I'll add them back in after) and expanded the raised section in order to fit my station (produced by Ill Tonkso) and approach road. The bridge section visible in the second pic is the Rail Over Road Tressle by JayStimson All thats left is to fill in any remaining embankment tiles with grass filler lots & trees and to add in any zoning where space is available.

This is a quick and simple technique for "merging" a single lane split highway to a regular ground highway. First create a stretch of ground highway and demolish a small section where you want the merge to occur. Connect a single tile length of avenue to one end of your highway like so: Next, run a small one way road section to join at the convergance of the highway and the avenue. Be sure that the direction of the one way road matches the direction that the split highway lane will have once connected. Once you have this completed, run another ground highway up to the one way road so that the lanes connect. Now run a section of rail along the unwanted lane of the new highway to demolish it. Once completed, demolish the rail line as well. You will now have your split highway connecting to the ground highway and as long as you have taken care to ensure traffic flow is in the correct direction, the junction will work like any other in the game. The next step is to re-connect the original highway using a new section of ground highway. You will now have the finished product. Although the merge is noticable, it is not too obvious (particularly at higher zooms) and a few trees will help to disguise it all the more. The important thing is, it works.

The following technique will allow for a population growth of around 40,000 combined with a monthly profit of between $1,500 – $3,500 within 5 years, when playing on “hard” game-play setting. I would like to thank vab423 & DOXXP29 for testing the technique for me and for their invaluable feedback and suggestions that have improved the original theory. I use this method sometimes to provide what I call “off map” contribution to regional play. This enables the positive (and cumulative) effect of regional growth to be used to fuel demand in a connected city where I might be looking more for aesthetics. In this example I should point out the mods I have in place on my system that may effect game-play, although it is not necessary to have the all those listed on your system for the technique to work. Note: I do not have any demand mods installed at all. The NAM (optional). Radius Doubler (optional). Industry Jobs Quadrupler (required). Ok, first select a small city square and establish your city. Now, set your taxes as follows: Run the blank city without development for at least 1 month in order to allow the city ordinances to appear in your menu. Once you have done this, enact the following ordinances: Pro Reading Smoke Detector Free Clinic CPR Training. Again, you can actually achieve good results without enacting all these ordinances, but I have found that the benefits they bring are positive early in the game. In addition, you may also enact the gambling ordinance as DOXXP29 proved during testing that this does not have a negative effect on results, so in turn actually speeds up the profit growth. Now, go into the utilities menu and select water pipes. You are going to lay the pipes in a particular pattern, which is both cost effective and provides the optimum coverage. Start the pipes 5 tiles in from the top left corner and one or two tiles down from the top. A tip here is that the horizontal pipes that connect each vertical row will cost $143. This saves counting out the gap each time. Incidentally I have tested pipe layouts several times and I have yet to find a more efficient way to supply a whole city square (regardless of size). Once you have done this, put in a single water pump on the tip of your pipe system. A note on water supply: if you are looking for rapid growth, water is essential. Its initial cost is quickly and easily outweighed by the benefits brought about by increased density and subsequently, increased tax revenue. The important thing to remember always is return on investment…how many $ will my original $ spent bring in? Next comes the perimeter road. This road will be 4 tiles in from the edge of the map (meaning you will have a space for a 3 tile deep zoning area) and will connect to neighbouring cities on all sides. Once the perimeter road is in place create roads in a grid fashion into 6x6 blocks, starting from each end and moving in towards the centre. As you approach the centre from both sides, you will notice that it is not possible to have equal block sizes at this point. Instead, create a row of blocks either side 3 tiles wide. This is very important, as it will leave you with a central block of specific proportions for our next step. If you are at all unsure about this layout, please study the image below. Now, in the central block you will need to place the following services: A Small Police Station. A Small Fire Station. An Elementary School. A High School. A Library. A Small Health Clinic. If you place them as shown below, you will note they fit perfectly into the space provided. Set your funding to fairly average levels, but cut ambulance & school bus to zero. Now this is one point where a radius doubler helps as you are still left with good coverage even at zero. Now onto zoning. Using only high density zoning for all types, lay out your zones in the pattern shown below. Note that I have left a gap in the industry zoning close to the water pump. This will give you just a little extra time (but not much) before industry starts to affect your water quality. You will also note that I have placed a power plant and connected up my zones with power lines. I have used a non-polluting gas power plant from the STEX for this, but I have also run the simulation with the standard in game coal power plant and the difference is negligible due to the short period of time you will be running the simulation. Your budget should now look something like this: Ok, you’re ready to flick the switch and start the clock running. I use cheetah speed as little is going to happen that you need to watch particularly. Pretty quickly, you’re going to dive into the red but this is all part of the plan. Take out a loan for $50,000 over 10 years and then hit go again. You will note that the clinic and elementary school very quickly go way over capacity and the sims will moan and strike, as you’d expect them to. My advice is to ignore them and let them suffer for a little while..after all you’re only aiming for a 5 year target. Beyond that just wait for the 5 years to roll on (you do not need to respond to requests for rewards). You should now be left with something like this: So now you have profit, a healthy population (in numbers terms), an existing water system, flourishing industry & commercial and still plenty of residential demand. You have lots of development space and the beginnings of a health and education system. On the downside you have an emerging pollution problem, the first glimpses of a crime problem and no parks, no greenery and no entertainment, but plenty of profit to put all that right!

If you have a question on this article, please PM Rochefort or make a thread in the Omnibus Feedback Forum! This is a brief explanation of the basic uses of smoncrie’s hole digger lots for creating tunnels and channels for sunken transportation routes.First up are the hole digger lots used for creating tunnels. Although I have shown each lot producing it’s intended tunnel i.e. the highway digger lot producing a tunnel for a highway, each lot can be used for any transportation mode. Next is a basic explanation of the combinations resulting from the use of smoncrie's hole digger lots to produce channels for transport networks and the visual effect created when you lay bridge puzzle pieces across them with the NAM Each hole digger lot produces a particular depth or height if you're using the ground lifter lot. Although they were originally created for tunnelling, they can be used for producing sunken/raised transport routes. The optimum depth/height is 15m from ground level. This will enable you to create a perfectly straight bridge. All other measurements will produce a slight (or extreme) variation. You can also expand the area in question using either a further row of hole digger lots or by the single road tile method. For example, I regularly expand the sunken lot to two-tile width for sunken avenues/highways instead of using the hole digger allocated for that purpose. The best way for you to understand this is to see the alternatives, using a road bridge as a constant in the theme. 8m Rail Channel 10m Rail Channel 15m Raised Bank 14m Road Channel 17m Road Channel 15m Sunken Channel 14m Avenue Channel 12m Ground Highway Channel 23m Monorail Channel 26m Monorail Channel If you have a question on this article, please PM Rochefort or make a thread in the Omnibus Feedback Forum!

Welcome to Rochefort's world of semi-useless trivia tutorials...this is number 3 I think !! I'd like to thank Tungston for his inspiration on this one..even though he had no idea he'd inspired me. It came about due to a height problem I had with maps, which Tungston kindly fixed for me. So here goes....... Rochefort's Mini Tutorial on Sharp as a Razor Rivers Firstly, this can only really be done before you start a city as certain steps will wreck your creations. You'll also need smoncrie's hole digger tools. Step 1 Go into God Mode and raise the whole terrain by one click. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//Start%20Raise.JPG align=baseline> Step 2 Now go into Mayor Mode and draw a line of sunken road hole digger tiles (you could actually use any of the digger versions, but I found you could be more accurate with sunken). https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//Step%201%20RR.JPG align=baseline> Step 3 Draw a road across the tiles. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//Step%202%20RR.JPG align=baseline> Step 4 Demolish the road and lay the sunken tiles again in the channel. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//Step%203%20RR.JPG align=baseline> Step 5 Draw the road again, demolish and then repeat the process one more time (making 3 times....you might find with a tile that digs deeper, you'll only have to do it twice). You should end up with this: https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//Step%205%20RR.JPG align=baseline> Incidentally, you might have to tidy up the edges with single road tiles if you get any un-even areas. Final step Using ctl + shift + alt, go back into God Mode and lower the terrain back one click. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//Final%20Lower.JPG align=baseline> So.......big drum roll.......you end up with a kick ass razor sharp river !!!!! https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//End%20Result.JPG align=baseline> I have absolutely no idea what anyone might use this for, but I liked it anyway.....in fact I liked it so much I made a matchstick horse while I was at it. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//The%20Horse.JPG align=baseline> https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//Horse%20Close%20Up.JPG align=baseline> Well I have taken up enough of your valuable time, so thanks for spending a few minutes with me and have fun whatever you do. Bye for now. Rochefort

WHO WANTS TO BE A MILLIONAIRE? - I DO !! Hi everyone and welcome to my simcity version of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. I've been playing around with grid systems and making cities with a million + residents for several months now and I thought it would be fun to share one such attempt with you. The intention is to build a pre-planned city (large city tile) using money cheats, lots of modds, a horrendously uniformed grid system and low, low taxes. To start with, here's a list of the modds I have installed that will affect the results: NAM - using the better pathfinding 5x capacity, 10x speed, 10x commute Abandonment & dilapidation modd Opera house fix Industry quadrupler Bones1 less abandonment Radius doubler Note: I am not using the Super Demand modd Next a couple of modds I'm using that wont affect the results but you'll notice them anyway: Euro road textures No one way arrows I will list custom content as I go along, in relation to BATs, lots etc..that I use. I will not be connecting to the region other than off map roads/rail, so this is a single city attempt. As stated before it is completely pre-planned, meaning that I will build all transport, education, civic facilities and zone BEFORE i hit go !! In order to do this I need a whopping amount of cash so I've run the city blank for a month with the Super Cash Park by stardog13 in order to give myself $4 billion to pay for it all. So, on with the first section - Transport System. The grid system will be based on producing the standard 6x6 squares using alternating one way roads to improve traffic flow, but will also incorporate Elevated Rail "channels" running both North-South & East-West. I have started from the edge of the map in all directions to ensure uniformity. Only a small section in the centre of the map will be different due to the maths of the idea. As you can see in the pic below, I have left a gap of 3 tiles all the way around the map, in order to accomodate zoning AND to provide "off map" two way roads as we are not able to run one way roads off the map. So, in order to produce my connections, I have to first demolish a section of my one way system all the way round the map. You will notice throughout this journal that i often produce something only to demolish part of it. this is done from convenience and since money is no object it's far easier than being precice all the time. Then I'll tidy up the edges. Now, I will place all my two way roads to provide connections with the region. I'll be going into more detail on zoning at a later date, but it might interest you to know that all my Industrial zoning will be in the outer areas of the map in order to provide easy access for trucks and keep those freight times down. Next, I'm going to place alternate rows of bus stops. I am using a custom bus stop here by bgtcn. Once I have covered the map with bus stops, its time to put in alternating rows of subway stations. This time I'm using a custom subway stop by gshmails. The result is a totally uniform bus/subway system. As you can see from the pic below, the grid system is applicable to the subway system also. Now, I'm going to add in some elevated rail, but first I need to demolish the small square junctions that my one way road system produces. By doing this, I can produce the ELR "channels" I mentioned earlier. Once that's complete I can run my ELR through all the channels on the map. As you'll notice, the ELR tracks cross each other at right angles and thus prevent traversing from one line to another. We need to fix that by demolishing these junctions and replacing them with "turnstile" type hubs. Finally, to complete this transormation I will link up the one way system around each turnstile. Now I'm going to add a station to each hub. Again I'm using a custom station, this time by morifari. As you'll note, adding the stations destroy my turnstiles....hey ho, just got to redo em !! Now I'm going to add deadwood's excellent ELR shops to all the unused areas of my ELR. Not only do they look great, but they'll provide 45,600 CS$ jobs once all placed !!! Now, back to the hubs. I've some wasted space here...or so it seems. Actually I've done this intentionally. 1 million sims need a hell of a lot of MT and the bus/subway stops I've provided so far will not be enough. To help with this, I'm going to use this space to provide a lot more MT. First I'm going to add some extra subway connections. The main subway lines run to the right of the hubs on the Eastern side of the city and on the left over in the West. Once complete, I will use some of the remaining tiles for additional bus stops. So, we now have our transport system in place, well able to handle 1 million + sims. Finally some quick stats on the transport: 112 ELR Stations 720 Bus Stops 720 Subway Stops In the next section, I'll be putting in utilities & some civic services. Rochefort

This VERY easy technique will help you to produce an attractive & realistic highway Junction, similar to ones seen all over the UK and the rest of Europe which use a one way roundabout to control traffic flow around the Junction. Although I presume you already know how to produce a sunken highway, I will explain to those new to the game. Using smoncrie's "sunken" hole digger lots, dig a small strip about 10 tiles long and then expand using single road tiles. Once you have completed this, lay a ground highway in the channel. Decide on the location of your Junction and demolish a strip of the ground highway large enough to construct the Junction (somewhere around 15-20 tile length). Once demolished, "fill in" the empty channel you now have, in order to bring it back up to ground level. I find the easiest way to do this is with single road tiles. Now place a raised highway section in the area you have just levelled. Connect up the ground highway to the raised highway. In this tutorial, the transition is a little bumpy (although not too bad) but with a bit of practice you can make this transition as smooth as if your ground highway were at ground level rather than sunken. The results look very pleasing indeed. Now place two single road tiles either side of the raised highway where you want the first on/off ramp to be. This will prevent a double on/off ramp being formed when we run a one way road under the highway. Repeat the process for the other set of on/off ramps and connect up the one way road into a rough expanded version of a roundabout. All that remains is to connect up your road network, add a few grass filler tiles and trees and you're done.

This is a very simple technique for creating realistic lakes and Ponds. In order to re-create this technique you will either need smoncrie's hole digger lots or you can use the Mayor Mode ground lowering tool. You will also need jeronij's ploppable water, available on the STEX. Lay "sunken" hole digger lots in a random shape to your liking. When doing so, remember that you will still need to draw a road over them to activate the lots, so be sure you are able to do so with aligned lots. Demolish the digger lots and then define the boundaries of your pond/lake using single road tiles. Next, create the banks of the pond/lake by covering all sloping sides using a grass filler tile of your choice (I have used the in-game grass lot but there are many variations available on the STEX). Create a road around the lake (optional of course) and fill in any empty tiles with your grass filler lots. Now add the ploppable water...if you really want realism then do not be afraid to overlap your grass filler lots slightly..Ponds and lakes have very few straight edges. Finally, add trees to a) help disguise some of the rougher edges of the water b) add realism..where there is inland water, there are generally trees & c) because it looks nice!

It seems Sims love to shop, so this tutorial will help you to create realistic shopping centres as seen on the outskirts of major towns and cities all over Europe and North America. Essentials for this are smoncrie's hole digger lots and one of the many slope mods available. I personally use the one created by bones1, but any others will give the same effect. First of all plan your shopping centre in order to be sure a) your layout fits where you want it to b) you have accounted for where your development will be c) you like it !! I generally "draw" my new developments with roads as its fairly cheap and shows up the design well. My plan here is to have 4 6x6 blocks either side with 2 6x6 blocks at each end. The centre of the site will house a rail station and lots of parking. There will be an outer road which will cut in diagonally at the ends in order to give the shape some aesthetics. Now, for the sake of making it look interesting we are going to raise the level of the whole site using the ground lifter lots by smoncrie. Its only necessary to raise a small area first as you can expand this by use of the Mayor Mode levelling tool of by laying single road tiles. Remember to demolish the outer road at this point or you will end up with a bit of a mess around the edges which will only mean more work to tidy it up. Once you have raised this section, expand it and re-create the same shape you had at ground level. Once you have the general shape, re-draw your original plan..this helps to ensure you have the correct size of raised area and also helps for aligning things as you go along. Now, we are going to add a rail link to the site. We do not want to take up any retail space, so the rail will enter via a tunnel. I am not a big fan of plummeting slopes (especially for rail), so we are going to create a very gently sloping tunnel. The tunnel is going to enter from the western side of the site, going under the end units and surfacing in the central parking area. Using single road tiles, dig a double tile width route for the tunnel ending only a tile or two into the central area. Next, run a stretch of ground highway down from the upper to the lower level. You will note in the image below that the highway is bending inwards at the join of the two levels. This means that the slope will invert and once demolished it will provide us with the gentle descent we are looking for. For the next step, use single road tiles to fill the tunnel back in to the point of where the slope begins to rise. This should be 1 tile away from the inner road. Also re-draw your plan at this point. You should also add an extra tile width at the exit point of the tunnel, which will prevent it from destroying the outer road. Once everything is in place, drag your first rail tunnel through and then repeat the process so you are left with a double tunnel. Plop your desired rail station..in this case it is the clock station by simgoober, and then tidy up the tunnel entrance/exit as you see fit. I've used some simple fenced grass filler lots and tunnel overpasses. Complete the central area by placing parking lots to all the remaining space...shopping centres have lots of parking spaces! You can now either zone out the areas you have reserved for CS or you can plop units if you have them in your plug in folder. I have plopped all the units on display here for the convenience of the tutorial but I have built many centres like this with zoned, growable units instead. All that's left is to connect your shopping centre to your transport network and add eye candy to your empty tiles. If you have any questions on this tutorial, please Private Message Rochefort!

Hi everyone and welcome to yet another tutorial. Isn't it every sim's dream to spend endless Saturday afternoons spending their hard earned cash on groceries, a new hat or even one of those beaded seat covers for the family car? Personally I hate shopping, but you can't argue with foot-fall, so in response I present to you a tutorial on giving the sims what they want...shopping heaven. Now as usual, no rocket science required but in this case PLENTY of BATs, smoncrie's hole digger lots and a slope mod like the one produced by bones1. At the end of the tutorial I've posted a credits screenshot so if you want to include any of the cool stuff you see here, I'm sure you'll be able to find it on the STEX. So, I like things raised or sunken..in this case I'm going to hoist my shopping centre up a little using smoncries hole digging tiles ground lifter. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//1-%20Raise%20Land%20SC.JPG align=baseline> Once I have a few tiles raised up I'm going to use the Mayor mode ground leveller tool to open the area up. My sims want plenty of choice so I'm going for an area 33 x 30 tiles in size, but you can pretty much please yourself. Tidy up the edges using single road tiles and everything is looking sharp ! https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//2%20-%20Square%20Off%20SC.JPG align=baseline> Now, I want the entrances to the shopping centre to be at the corners, for no other reason than variety. For this, I'm going to produce one way In/Out ramps that extend out from the corners. Again using single road tiles extend the corner out from the main area to produce a kind of arrowhead effect. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//3%20-%20Corner%20Arrow%20SC.JPG align=baseline> Repeat at each corner. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//4%20-%20All%204%20Corners%20SC.JPG align=baseline> Next lay the outer access road around the edges of the raised area....make this a straight line avenue/road..do not take the road close up to the main area along the outside. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//5%20-%20Ring%20Road%20SC.JPG align=baseline> Now, using a crossed over road to ensure you get an extruded slope, lay the roads down from each edge of the arrowhead shape. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//6%20-%20Draw%20Slopes%20SC.JPG align=baseline> Repeat all the way around and you should end up with a nice smooth gradient for your slopes. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//7%20-%20Slope%20Laid%20Bare%20SC.JPG align=baseline> Now, lay one way roads at each corner...one to go IN and one to go OUT for each. this way, your sims will be able to access/leave from/to any point on the map. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//8%20-%20In%20-%20Out%20Direction%20Arrows%20SC.JPG align=baseline> If you recall, I asked you not to take your avenues in too close to the shopping area. This was because you need transit stops, pedestrian access and some eye candy decoration around the entrances. The next screenshot shows my own preferences but you may well want a different configuration. You can see in the next two screenshots below work by morifari & siqueira_scb (walls), marrast (steps) and bgtcn (bus stops). The pedestrian access to and from the steps are the tiles provided in the road menu with the NAM. I'm not sure who the poplar trees are by, but I will search through my plug-ins list and edit them into the post later. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//9%20-%20Bus%20Stops%20-%20Wall%20-%20Steps%20SC.JPG align=baseline> Next, you will need to carry out the following 3 stage process to join the one way access roads into the shopping centre itself. begin in each corner with a one way roundabout (you'll need the NAM for this). https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//11%20-%20Corner%20Roundabout%20Start%20SC.JPG align=baseline> https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//12%20-%20Corner%20Roundabout%20Walls%20SC.JPG align=baseline> https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//13%20-%20Corner%20Roundabout%20Complete%20SC.JPG align=baseline> Repeat for each corner. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//14%20-%20Corner%20Roundabout%20Zoom%20Out%20SC.JPG align=baseline> Well that's pretty much it for the tutorial...how you fill the centre itself is up to you and your BAT list. Here's how I did it, but first the credits. You'll see billboards by dev and extensive use of jeronij's tarmac paths set to produce the parking. All BATS are listed in the next screenshot. https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//16%20-%20Far%20Zoom%20SC%20+%20Credits.JPG align=baseline> https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//17%20-%20Zoom%20Out%20SC%201.JPG align=baseline> https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//18%20-%20Zoom%20Out%20SC%202.JPG align=baseline> https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//19%20-%20Finished%20SC%201.JPG align=baseline> https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//20%20-%20Finished%20SC%202.JPG align=baseline> https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//21%20-%20Finished%20SC%203.JPG align=baseline> https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//23%20-%20Finished%20SC%205.JPG align=baseline> https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//25%20-%20Finished%20SC%207.JPG align=baseline> I hope you like, but that's all for now. Rochefort

Its a current affair in my world !!!! I hope you'll all forgive me a moment of self indulgence, but I became a dad for the third time tonight (30/06/07) at 7.24pm GMT. Ethan Joe weighed in at 7lb 2oz, mother & baby doing fine. A little ray of sunshine on a rainy day in Manchester.

congrats and well deserved.

Things were looking a bit youthful around here, so I thought I'd bump the average age up a notch.

thank you everyone...even you duke

Its been discussed many times...plopped residential doesnt work...full stop. Try it by all means and if you succeed, take pics and post it on the forum...we'd all like to know.

You know what I reckon? We all have our favourites and none of us has seen anywhere near enough of the world to make such a grand judgement. However, I love to see the passion aroused in ST members about architecture...I swear you can learn more here than you can on a dozen academic websites. Fair play to you all...there is much to learn from what is voiced here. I enjoy every post.

Thank you everyone for all the kind words. I enjoyed doing it & I'm glad some of you enjoyed reading it.

Manchester

There are two options available on the STEX - Lower Pedriana Farms Frequency Mod or Pedriana Plants Killer Modd If the links don't work, just type Pedriana in the STEX search box

WHO WANTS TO BE A MILLIONAIRE ? Well its time to ring the death knell on this one. I did say It was straight to the million and then quits, so here's the final update and after that no more. Firstly, thank you very much for all the kind comments you've all posted over the few days of this short lived CJ. I appreciate you stopping by and making it enjoyable for me to produce. 2ch.net simplayer, to answer your question education levels are poor. You're absolutely right, there just isnt enough time for the EQ to catch up. Still doesn't seem to harm the experiment. powerdc, dont be too hard on yourself...you were actually right about one aspect. As time progresses Industry does start to be the problem. Due to the fact that Industry yields far fewer jobs per tile than Commercial, I ran out of space to keep up with demand. As the EQ levels cannot rise quick enough, the demand for IM & IHT way outstrips any Commercial demand and subsequently the growth stagnates at around 1.3m for a good 20-30 years. You'll see in the final image that even the "buffer zone" is eventually given over to Industry. So, I reloaded the city one more time......this time I added 4 of thegrindre's RAH Wat-Air Purifiers to the map to kill Industrial pollution. They do not get rid of traffic pollution but I was sure the bonus they would provide at clearing a good proportion might just help me get to the million quicker. And................. 7 years !! Go me !! As you can see in this image, the pollution was more than halved from previous attempts and I've no doubt its a big plus factor in growth of Commercial demand, which in turn helped to speed up my Residential demand. I can also reflect now on why the city works so well. In part of course, you have to consider the modds, the money cheat, plopping rewards etc.. and they do have a very large effect. But if I had to point out the specific areas where the biggest boost to growth appears I'd have to pick the design of the transport and the zoning. We all know how importnant MT is in the game. Commute time kills more cities than any other factor..just look around at the numerous "commute time" threads in the forums. I managed to produce a city with over 1 million sims and an average commute time of.....2.5 minutes !! As you can see in the graph below, car traffic is right near the bottom of the list...elevated rail and (surprisingly) pedestrians are the major movers. I put this down to the design of the zoning. No one had far to go to work. And finally, I ran the game for a few years after I hit the million and in all cases it stagnated at around 1.3m around year 15 and stayed that way for the next 20-30 years. Thanks for reading. I hope you've enjoyed this short CJ....I have to think of something else to do now. Rochefort

Thanks for the kind words everyone. I reloaded the city again & this time I plopped a load of rewards, schools, extra waste disposal, a prison etc...BEFORE I ran the simulator and guess what? Now 8 years is going to be hard to beat. Rochefort

So here we go. In true geeky style I've timed the whole thing...stop watch at the ready. Hit "GO" this afternoon and this is how it went: 53 seconds of gameplay - 06/04/00 simtime - population 58,405 Plopped the Mayor's Mansion, 1 x Maxis Church, 3 x Simgoober Reward Churches. 1 minute 14 seconds of gameplay - 22/08/00 simtime - population 102,879 Plopped Mayor's Statue Large & Small plus Disease Research Centre 2 minutes 7 seconds of gameplay - 16/12/00 simtime - population 218,182 Plopped CocaCola HQ, 1st Private School & Major Art Museum 3 minutes 22 seconds of gameplay - 13/06/01 simtime - population 402,976 First strike - Education starting to suffer, not enough coverage so plopped new elementary school. 3 minutes 58 seconds of gameplay - 15/10/01 simtime - population 500, 677 Education suffering so plopped 4 new elementary schools. 4 minutes 52 seconds of gameplay - 17/04/02 simtime - population 621,650 Plopped Mitchell bld, Larkin Admin, 2nd Private School, 2nd Maxis Church 5 minutes 5 seconds of gameplay - 03/09/02 simtime - population 648,601 1st negative demand.....education is pants, knee jerk reaction so I plopped 3 new elementary schools, Aramark HQ, 3rd Maxis Church, Colossal Mayor Statue, Radio Station, Large Simgoober Reward Church, City Hall, St John's Church. 7 minutes 32 seconds of gameplay - 08/09/03 simtime - 692,180 Back in positive demand. 9 minutes 31 seconds of gameplay - 14/04/04 simtime - 751,090 Still only 1 high rise Commercial building & traffic good....pollution way below what I first expected.. 13 minutes 29 seconds of gameplay - 15/06/05 simtime - population 803,055 Plopped Stock Exchange, 3rd Private School, 4th Maxis Church. 16 minutes 50 seconds of gameplay - 15/08/06 simtime - population 858,749 1st time water capacity reached, plopped large water pump. Also demolished some dirty Industrial to make way for IHT & IM demand. First signs of high rise Commercial & demand has recovered substantially. 19 minutes 29 seconds of gameplay - 15/08/07 simtime - population 901,320 Plopped 2 new high schools to cope with education demand. 25 minutes 5 seconds of gameplay - 15/09/09 simtime - population 950,490 Growth slowing. 31 minutes 1 second of gameplay - 28/01/10 simtime - population 978,024 Education strikes, water capacity reached, traffic problems at many of the transit hubs (bus & subway stops over capacity)...although no road problems as yet. 31 minutes 24 seconds of gameplay - 14/12/11 simtime - population 1,003,097 WE MADE IT !!! Just so you're sure there was no regional "assistance" So 11 years to get to 1 million...........I reckon it could be done in 10 !!! Anyone want to prove me right??? Rochefort

congrats are well deserved.