Sydney Claridge

UPDATE: I checked, and the tallest building is actually the Stantec Tower in Edmonton! The Stantec Tower is the tallest building in all of Western Canada; taller than anything in Metro Vancouver (on which this city is based).

Welcome to Simply Stunning New Alexandria! A landscape of unparalleled beauty and an array of diverse, eclectic cities awaits. ~~~~~~ I will likely showcase multiple cities in this city journal. After all, I named the city journal the Province of New Alexandria, so we're also going to check out other cities elsewhere in the province, eventually. For now, the focus will remain on (what will become) the province's largest city, Aritzia. I'm currently working on Aritzia Central City, the city's dense urban core. This is very much a city of glass, with a lot of contemporary architecture, and some older buildings mixed in for good measure. The skyline I've created thus far is preliminary, and will likely change as I begin to consider where I will establish view corridors, as well as the mass transit lines, likely a mix of subways and elevated lines. Let's look at an overview of Central City so far: It's not very much, I know. Let's go down to the street and get some views down there: That's all for now. Hope you enjoyed!

This city is going to get dense. Based on your comment, I’m definitely planning on keeping a lot of trees around to maintain the appearance of natural surroundings. Vancouver-style view corridors are also in the works. I appreciate your suggestion!

I'm not quite sure about the tallest building, unfortunately. I know the Vancouver buildings, and the Seattle one, but unfortunately, that's all I know.

There hasn't been a post in this thread for a few years, but I might as well show off my newest CS1 city. Welcome to Simply Stunning New Alexandria! More specifically, the largest city in the province, Aritzia. I'm starting work on the urban core; everything here is preliminary, and subject to change. For instance, I will probably change this skyline as I establish view corridors. Not only of the mountains in the background, but also "inward-facing" view corridors with signature structures serving as focal points; I think something similar to this might have been proposed in the Trinity Uptown Plan for Fort Worth (my hometown). I suspect the real-world city from which I'm drawing my inspiration is very clear: I hope you enjoyed!

Here's a suburban landscape in Kerrisdale, a suburb northwest of downtown Soderstrom (albeit within Soderstrom city limits) not far from Soderstrom International Airport: Looking north across the east-west State Highway 120 (SH-120). This is the main freeway in northwest Soderstrom. Looking west across Kerrisdale Avenue at the Kerrisdale town center. A section of SH-120 is visible at the bottom-right.

Welcome to Evans, a master-planned suburban district conveniently located 15-20 miles west-northwest of downtown Soderstrom along the greater Soderstrom region's outer beltway, State Highway 400. Evans draws inspiration from the suburbs of Dallas-Fort Worth, namely Frisco. This is the main retail district of Evans, including its centerpiece shopping mall, Parkwood Square. Suburban nightmare or shoppers' paradise? You decide. ~~~~~~ ABOVE: a general overview of Evans' shopping district, looking west across SH-400. The six-lane avenue is Legacy Parkway. Anchored by Nordstrom, JCPenney, Sears, Dillard's, and Macy's, Parkwood Square features over 165 stores, restaurants, and entertainment options. Opened on June 1, 2002 with two levels (three floors in Macy's and Dillard's), Parkwood Square is the third-largest shopping mall in the greater Soderstrom region, based on square footage. At the time of its 2002 opening, Parkwood Square also introduced the greater Soderstrom region to three well-known clothing brands: Hollister Co. (teen clothing retailer owned by Abercrombie & Fitch), Forever 21 (young women's clothing, at the time) and White House Black Market (women's clothing boutique acquired by Chico's in 2003). Despite the "retail apocalypse," all three of these stores retain locations at Parkwood Square, albeit with some changes over the years. WHBM moved into a slightly larger space in mid-2014 with the opening of its sister brands Chico's and Soma Intimates at Parkwood Square (with Chico's occupying the original WHBM space). Hollister received a complete renovation in mid-2015, also in conjunction with minor renovations to the stores of its sister brands Abercrombie & Fitch and Abercrombie Kids. Around the same time, and most significantly, Forever 21 moved and expanded into a junior anchor location in mid-2015 with an expanded selection of women's clothing, along with the addition of men's and children's clothing. ~~~~~~ BELOW (next 2 images): an upscale strip shopping center directly across SH-400 from Parkwood Square. Evans is an affluent suburb, in a similar vein to most of the western and northwestern Soderstrom suburbs (the affluence here compares with suburbs north of Dallas, like Plano, Frisco, and Allen); shopping centers like these fit the upscale vibe very well. I've gone crazy with these wonderful shopping centers by RRetail, this one based off of a real-life shopping center in Clarksburg, Maryland (the Harris Teeter captures that region's "flavor" in terms of regional grocers, but aside from that, most of the other brands I see here are in DFW): ~~~~~~ BELOW (next 2 images): an H-E-B grocery store with a Braum's (fast food with a small grocery) as an outparcel. Now this really captures a North Texas/DFW regional vibe, especially with H-E-B's recent expansion into DFW! ~~~~~~ BELOW: another strip shopping center on the northeast corner of SH-400 and Legacy Parkway features several big-box stores, including a Nordstrom Rack (as an off-price complement to the full-line Nordstrom at Parkwood Square), a Barnes & Noble, as well as a Trader Joe's, among others: ~~~~~~ While it has a wonderful, dense downtown (AKA the kind of place where I'd prefer to live) and other dense districts in the central city connected with mass transit, the greater Soderstrom region is massive. Just like DFW and Houston, suburban sprawl and massive freeways abound. While the 8-lane freeway still handles traffic pretty well outside of rush hours, plans already exist to add 4 managed toll lanes to SH-400 in the Evans vicinity with SH-400 expected to reach a breaking point soon.

I've been using the new NAM 42 to start rebuilding one of the largest interchanges in the Soderstrom metropolitan area, between I-30 and the I-435 West Loop. No more underground express lanes on I-30 (east-west/right-left freeway in image)! Sadly I was not able to rebuild all of the express lane connections, but I kept the most important ones (eastbound-to-northbound and vice-versa, which were previously underground). I had hoped to make a 16-connector interchange (full connections between general purpose and express lanes), but that was just too much. Here's the original interchange. Nice and large, but the limitations of old NAM versions are evident, with the Big Dig tunnels and all: And now for the NAM 42 version. There are still some changes to be made here, especially with that avenue interchange on the north end, and completing the freeway lighting:

This definitely reminds me of Houston-area suburbia; all those trees (they look coniferous) are reminiscent of the Woodlands I would have to say. I'm a Texan, but I'm from DFW, and we definitely have less trees here relative to most parts of the Houston metro area; what we have tends to be of the deciduous/broadleaf variety, and so does Austin and San Antonio. If you are going more for DFW/Austin/San Antonio suburbia (or even the western Houston metro area around Katy), flora that resembles oaks, hickories, and elms (and the occasional small conifer) are much more suitable.

I don't have any images from Cities: Skylines available at this moment (though I have made express/local highways before), but you might look at jackskellington6's Metro Highlands series on YouTube as he has an express/local setup on one of his highways. Example 1, Example 2, Example 3.

Definitely reminds me of some of the nicer Houston-area suburbs (such as The Woodlands), given the dense woods and tall trees. With shorter trees, it also resembles Stone Oak in far northern San Antonio somewhat, not to mention the choice of road name; there is indeed a Sonterra Blvd in the Stone Oak area.

The densely forested hills, warm-weather foliage, and British influences remind me somewhat of Hong Kong (it has been 23 years since they were a British colony, but the influence is still there in many places, including road signage), as well as the British Virgin Islands.

Take a look at this project I am just starting on a custom map; I may decide to release the map at a later date possibly. It's based on a real-world place (I'll let you choose a name for something in the city if you are the first person to correctly guess what real-world place this is). Since I'm really getting into Cities:Skylines now, I am planning to start a CJ around this map in the near future:

That region map looks wonderful. Could see some more areas filled in though, and better city-to-rural transitions. Perhaps a more gradual transition from the snowy area to the north to the green area could be done as well. Also look into the southwest peninsula (called Oshima in real-life Hokkaido) for expansion, though I do realize that the game that this region is based around (yes, I've played it) does not include that southwestern peninsula as part of its map. Since I know this map is based on Hokkaido, I'm looking at the southwest area in particular for some inspiration as there is an excellent Sapporo map by Drunkapple. Don't know if I will follow through on that inspiration though (I already have a massive region I'm building on right now).

Okay, so here is the finished product. This time, west is at the top (I-30 is top-to-bottom; SH-400 is left-to-right): It only needs a few final touches (completion of the high-mast lighting) and then it will be "fully" complete.

Great tutorial! I was able to complete this interchange (well, a variation anyways) with 2 of the left-turning connectors being single lane, and the other 2 left-turning connectors having 2 lanes. I'll post it as soon as a get a chance (and I was able to keep the "transfer" [interwoven ramps] between the mainlanes and the frontage roads that were between the interchange and the city border!).

I'm trying to do this right now; is there a certain order in which I need to place the FlexFly pieces and starter pieces? I'm trying this with the spacing you used and it isn't working (I can't place the FlexFly pieces) and I am on level terrain. I'm on the latest NAM (Sept 2017 release); are you happening to be using a developer/beta version by chance?

And I just got done making this beauty: Once again, this interchange is along Interstate 30 in the Soderstrom region, this time with State Highway (SH) 400, the Soderstrom regional outer loop (I-435 is the inner loop). South is at top. Interstate 30 is the east-to-west freeway here (with the managed express lanes) and SH-400 is the north-south freeway. This is a draft build; I may redo this in order to make all of the ramps UDI-compatible (perhaps to make Haljackey-style drive videos). I need some suggestions though since I'm fairly close to a city border (you can see it in the SE [top-left] corner), and I would like all of the ramps to be at ground level for the neighbor connection (in order to use the RHW neighbor connection pieces). I guess I could put SH-400 in a tunnel somehow, although I don't think there is a way to make a RHW-6S or an OWR-3 go into a UDI-compatible tunnel. The right-turn ramp in the top-right (SW) corner is a remnant of the old cloverstack that used to be here, prior to widening I-30 with express lanes. Also note that there are still some finishing touches needed for this interchange, namely the completion of the high-mast lighting.

Yep, that freeway was largely based on the Katy Freeway just west of the 610 loop in the Houston metro area (FYI, I'm not from Houston and have never lived there, though I admire their freeways). That 28 lane cross-section is not far off the mark of the widest point of the Katy Freeway, where there is a 29 lane cross-section (namely, at Bunker Hill Road; this includes freeway main lanes, managed lanes, auxiliary lanes, frontage roads, and turn lanes on the frontage roads). If my frontage roads in my post below were able to have turn lanes (but given the NAM's limitations they don't), I think I would be exceeding 29 lanes: That said, the ramps that connect to the express lanes by flying over the mainlanes (and which look like half-basketweaves of sorts) are more inspired by the TEXpress Lanes in the Dallas-Fort Worth area (which is where I am actually from!). I'd love to make a city journal for Soderstrom, a city which is very much inspired by Houston (there's a mix of Houston, NYC, and Chicago inspiration in different parts of the city; in spite of the Scandinavian name, the city's climate would be similar to DFW and North Texas), but I don't really have the time to. The freeways are absolutely mind-blowing, though I'm nowhere near done with the region. I'll probably post some more of the major freeway interchanges sometime in this thread.

I'll definitely have to try this one in my cities sometime. Many of my freeways have at-grade frontage roads, and this would work nicely for a relatively compact interchange (I've made stacks but you can't really make them with through frontage roads in SC4 without an ungodly amount of right-of-way). I'll probably separate the off-ramps though, mirroring how the on-ramps enter separately. I've seen this done with 1970s-era 4-level stacks in Texas, where traffic making a left-hand exit leaves on the first ramp, and right-hand exiting traffic leaves second; this stack in west Fort Worth being a quintessential example.

Here's a massive stack interchange between Interstate 30 (up and down in picture; top is east) and the Interstate 430 West Loop on the west side of the city of Soderstrom. It includes underground express lanes on I-30 plus express connector ramps for 4 out of the 8 possible movements: On the west (bottom) side of this interchange, the express lanes can also access the regular ramps connecting I-30 and I-430 (and vice-versa) too, although the two-way connector from west to south (right) directly connects the I-30 managed express lanes to the I-430 managed express lanes. Just west of (below) the above image, Interstate 30 has this massive cross-section, achieving a maximum total of 28 lanes when considering the freeway lanes, express lanes, frontage roads, and all auxiliary and acceleration lanes. This may very well be one of the widest freeways you'll ever see in SC4: To explain this image, the frontage roads are the outermost (surface) streets, then there are collector lanes (essentially long ramps connecting traffic to and from the I-430 loop), followed by the I-30 mainlanes inside that, and finally the I-30 managed express (toll) lanes. The weaving on-ramp on the bottom left side connects the westbound collector lane with the I-30 managed express lane, and a similar off-ramp for eastbound I-30 express also exists just below this image.

Those rock textures you used make this town look like it belongs somewhere near Yellowstone National Park, just considering the pictures I have seen from that part of Wyoming.

This is not the main business district in the Greater Soderstrom Region (a region I am developing), but I guess this qualifies. Of course, the name "Tilnor" comes from the two roads intersecting at the bottom center, Tildon Avenue and Nordstrom Avenue. North is to the left, along Tildon Avenue.

Raw carrots! And a glass of water.

All of this ruckus started when Mike Jeffries 2006 interview with Salon.com (for the article "The man behind Abercrombie & Fitch") resurfaced. Sometimes, old words come back to haunt you, especially in this day and age of political correctness. Abercrombie & Fitch is having some trouble staying relevant to today's youth, especially considering that popular "fast fashion" stores such as H&M and Forever 21 (who DO market plus-size lines) continue to bite into Abercrombie's market share. Although Abercrombie has faced similar dilemmas in the past, and always seem to get more attention (and business) from incidents such as this one, I believe that A&F is slowly dying, now that "fast fashion" owns the spotlight in youth fashion retail. Face it: today's youth want more than just a moose on an overpriced shirt. Maybe A&F is a "lifestyle brand," but youth will need a chance to interactively participate in that lifestyle rather than simply follow the depicted lifestyle. And I don't think the A&F lifestyle is one parents or ethically-minded youth will want to encourage, unless they eliminate any sexual references.