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CSGdesign's NATURAL GROWTH

Started by CSGdesign, November 20, 2009, 12:50:42 AM

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jmyers2043

Entertaining update. I enjoyed it a lot.

Jim Myers  (5th member of SC4 Devotion)

rooker1

Call me Robin, please.

Rady

Looked in here for the first time, but I have to say I'm impressed. Not only by the way the city looks, but also by the way you are presenting this MD. Fabulous!!

&apls &apls &apls
If it's a good idea, go ahead and do it. It's much easier to apologize than it is to get permission.

Visit my BAT thread: Slow BAT steady - Rady's first BAT attemtps

canyonjumper

lol, that's awesome :D That poor engineer. Excellent update.

                      -Jordan
I'm the one who jumped across the Grand Canyon... and lived.

mightygoose

Fantastic.... however kelly bay residents have missed a great oppurtunity for growth in terms of commuter stimulus, while residents celebrate, businesses will be feeling cheated...
NAM + CAM + RAM + SAM, that's how I roll....

warconstruct

excellent  $%Grinno$%  very great update !
Province of Acadia since 2020
Province of Zillerthal (2014)
Port Aux Captes (2009-2011)
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Since SC4D 2007-2022

rhythmandjays

Like most people who is watching this MD....I really like how you find the most cost-effective way to improve your growing city. Also, I like how your approach to this city...just build and respond to the needs of the city when something happens. Great MD here!

Battlecat

Interesting.  I think the business leaders of Kelly Bay would be wise to be look into to selling their land in the city core so they can relocated to wherever the new interchange will be going in at the edge of town.  I guess the question is which one of those roads leaving Kelly Bay is going to have the new interchange!

CSGdesign



Quote from: jmyers2043 on January 15, 2010, 04:15:50 AM
Entertaining update. I enjoyed it a lot.
Haha excellent!  I don't think I've seen you in here before? Welcome and I hope you continue to enjoy the entries!

Quote from: rooker1 on January 15, 2010, 04:41:34 AM
LOL, too funny.
;D Glad you like.  Beats crying in a corner about ppl hating my bridge. (sob)

Quote from: Rady on January 15, 2010, 05:27:53 AM
Looked in here for the first time, but I have to say I'm impressed. Not only by the way the city looks, but also by the way you are presenting this MD. Fabulous!!

&apls &apls &apls
Haha well good - I hope to see you in here more often!

Quote from: canyonjumper on January 15, 2010, 05:47:23 AM
lol, that's awesome :D That poor engineer. Excellent update.

                      -Jordan
Haha poor because his design caused such public discontent or poor because he moved to Adelaide?   ;)

Quote from: rhythmandjays on January 15, 2010, 08:27:24 AM
Like most people who is watching this MD....I really like how you find the most cost-effective way to improve your growing city. Also, I like how your approach to this city...just build and respond to the needs of the city when something happens. Great MD here!
Thankyou very much rhytmandjays, that is what I find more interesting as a method of playing... hope you continue to enjoy!

Quote from: Battlecat on January 15, 2010, 08:33:33 AM
Interesting.  I think the business leaders of Kelly Bay would be wise to be look into to selling their land in the city core so they can relocated to wherever the new interchange will be going in at the edge of town.  I guess the question is which one of those roads leaving Kelly Bay is going to have the new interchange!
It's an interesting and practical observation you make.  I think you will be as interested as I am to see how this highway affects growth in Kelly Bay, and Boston at large.  It really will make this tiny little town into a thriving metropolis, and even then that's only the beginning.  I have some very major plans for the future of this city.  I intend to take it far into the future and present some very thought-provoking representations of what the future may hold for humanity at large.



The northern most end of the southern stretch of the Eastern Sea-Board Highway (got all that?) terminated at the Mathshampton Junction, which was a very compact cluster of "unmoveables" such as rail lines, the Mathshampton University, the Simcorp Stadium, and a few others.  This made for some very space-limited options for the highway, and ultimately a raised highway was selected as the best option through the suburbs as the suburbs would largely be unaffected by the development beyond the actual corridor itself.

This was to be the most expensive piece of infrastructure ever built in Boston, ocosting more than the Carlson Memorial Bridge and the Boston Harbour Bridge combined, in inflationary-adjusted dollars.

It was essentially a highway bridge that stretched for almost two kilometers, with the added cost of the resumptions of every property lying in it's 35 meter wide path.  No small project, and one to be taken seriously.

The Junction itself had several drafts, including a set of lights, a give way intersection favouring through traffic from the highway into Mathshampton Road, and ultimately the selected proposal was for a terminating round-about with a speed-reduction zone that connected the pre-existing roads and allowed maximum throughput from all directions.



The area prior to development:


The development as an artist's impression submitted to council during final planning:



Plan of the Development:


Points of the Plan include:

1) Raised Eastern Sea-Board Highway South - raising the highway allows existing streets to remain un-disturbed by the development which minimises re-development of interstections and reduces turmoil caused to the neighbourhood by the highway.

2) Cravemore Road Underpass - reinforced barriers on either side of the street protect the highway pilons from accidental impact.  Cravemore Road will remain largely unchanged by the Junction.

3) Speed Reduction Zone
- highway is brought to ground level and traffic speed limit is reduced from 100kmph to 80kmph then finally to 60kmph around the roundabout, maximising throughput while reducing risk of speed-related accidents at the Junction.

4) Roundabout - connects to and allows throughput from Eastern Sea-Board Highway South, Mathshampton Road, Jacob Industry Way, and Porterhouse Street.

5) Pre-existing Roundabout - this pre-existing roundabout merges traffic from Jacob Industry Way and Mathshampton Road, representing the previous main intersection of these two roads.  In this plan it is kept and continues to serve this purpose.  Future development proposals will include a dual-carriage expressway leading from the new roundabout into both Mathshampton Road and Junction Way but traffic demands at this time do not require it.

The plan was made public in a small column at the back of an obscure magazine, in the hope that nobody noticed.  Council didn't want a repeat of the Kelly Crossing incident, and redrafting these plans was time-consuming and expensive. SimNation government had already indicated that another incident like Kelly Bay might lead to either a Federal Government over-ride of the entire project (which would disregard local expense and charge through with no regard for local repurcussions at all) or could even lead to the omission of Boston from the National Highway Grid altogether, with the highways bypassing Boston several kilometers to the west, with access to them only by a single city-sponsored main road.

Clearly this would not work in the city's favour and in fact would put Boston at a serious disadvantage to her neighbours and ultimately retard her growth.  But Simnation Government simply had no time or concern for local issues, and the cooperative mindset of local and federal governments was more of a courtesy than a requirement, and at the end of the day what the federal government wanted took priority and local council would simply have to foot the bill and clean up the mess.

bat

Two fantastic new updates there! And looking forward to more from the highway... ;)

emgmod

That seems like a really good way to end a highway. If it ended before the stadium, there would have to be more upgrading on the city streets than at the chosen place, where there is infrastructure in place.
Was removing one of the bus stops planned when you made the highway terminus? I understand that a bus waiting for passengers slows down traffic.

canyonjumper

Nice stuff! Again, really like the overlay, and the development plan is cool too! :D

                 -Jordan
I'm the one who jumped across the Grand Canyon... and lived.

kwakelaar

Interesting to read about all the different infrastructure projects and your approach to city planning.

Tomas Neto


CSGdesign

#154


Quote from: bat on January 16, 2010, 04:40:24 AM
Two fantastic new updates there! And looking forward to more from the highway... ;)
It'll take ages to complete, but I'm also looking forward to the final product so that I can focus on other things going on in the city.

Quote from: emgmod on January 16, 2010, 09:31:33 AM
That seems like a really good way to end a highway. If it ended before the stadium, there would have to be more upgrading on the city streets than at the chosen place, where there is infrastructure in place.
Was removing one of the bus stops planned when you made the highway terminus? I understand that a bus waiting for passengers slows down traffic.
Yeah that bus-stop became in the way.  Another one near the gates of the university will probably be put in to replace it, but that's not part of the proposal - that's part of the local infrastructure upgrading that will happen as a result of these highways.

Quote from: canyonjumper on January 16, 2010, 07:49:35 PM
Nice stuff! Again, really like the overlay, and the development plan is cool too! :D

                 -Jordan
Thanks! A different overlay this time... for kicks.

Quote from: kwakelaar on January 17, 2010, 12:48:09 AM
Interesting to read about all the different infrastructure projects and your approach to city planning.
Well considering this diary and city is supposed to be about a city growing without much master-planning at all, it's a bit difficult for me to get my head around so MUCH planning... even though it's all one project that has happened "spontaneously" the project itself needs a massive amount of planning to keep it realistic.

Quote from: Tomas Neto on January 17, 2010, 04:35:58 AM
Very nice update again!!!  :thumbsup:
Thankyou again Thomas, glad you're continuing to enjoy my posts!



Custom Content created for Simcity 4 is largely responsible for what is keeping this game alive...
No matter how awesome and complex and powerful the game itself is, human nature is that too much of the same thing (anything) will eventually become tiresome, and that is why Custom Content is so rewarding.
Not only does it attract the minds and creativity of people inclined and able to build the content, but their creations give other members of the community a monstrous wealth of new stuff to download, use, and decorate their cities with.
Creators of Custom Content provide this service free of charge, and largely free of recognition too... and in many cases such as Network Addon Mod, Rural Highway Mod, terrain mods, z simulators, and a hoste of others, this game and the community at large are greatly enriched by them.

Of course with the freedom of essentially anybody being able to create and share Custom Content, there are as much of a variety of refinement and quality as there are of types and styles. As a result, I personally don't think it is wise to install anything and everything that is out there. Not only are you likely to have one mod conflict with the resource requirements of another mod, but you are likely to end up with a lot of useless stuff cluttering up your menus and suddenly the Custom Content becomes less enriching and more of a pain in the - oh hi I didn't see you there.

So, having said that, let me point out that most of the Custom Content I use and show in this journal I have tried and tested and decided to keep, and a lot of mods that I download I test and throw away long before it ever becomes a part of my journal. The reason why I weed out many mods ranges from really beautiful towers housing 4000 sims that grow in low-density zones amongs tiny little 1 story shops (yuk4realism), or industrial lots that generate more garbage for that one lot than the rest of my city's industry COMBINED (I'm not kidding), or even it just doesn't look crash-hot.

I am very picky about the Custom Content I use, and where-ever possible I create my own to fill a gap. However this is very time-consuming so often I'll have a lot of great ideas but it takes me months to get around to them... and sometimes I never do.

Below is a list of the Custom Content that I have decided to keep and continue to use in Boston v2. I will add to this list as I increase my Custom Content. If you see something I'm using that isn't in this list, please let me know. I have omitted tools, dependencies, and resource packs... just actual mods.

Each image is a link to the download of that mod...
hope you find it useful.






































































I will add more as I download (or build), test, and decide to keep them.
So hopefully this dispells once and for all the myth that I hate Custom Content, and that I don't use it.
I'm just very, very choosey.
I'd rather have a few really good bits of Custom Content than a whole bunch of rubbish.

Battlecat

Well that's a great choice of mods there!  Pretty nice set of choices, including a few I didn't know existed!  There's actually a lot of sense to your decision to limit the number of mods since it will also help your game run faster.  With your method of bouncing around the region, gradually growing new buildings and slowly building infrastructure, that's a vital quality of life decision. 

As for the last update, letting that highway off into a large traffic circle is probably the most compact setup available for the area.  They're an amazingly efficient interchange up to a certain volume of traffic! 

Nanami

Well I missed a few nice update!

CSGdesign



Quote from: Battlecat on January 18, 2010, 10:24:14 AM
Well that's a great choice of mods there!  Pretty nice set of choices, including a few I didn't know existed!  There's actually a lot of sense to your decision to limit the number of mods since it will also help your game run faster.  With your method of bouncing around the region, gradually growing new buildings and slowly building infrastructure, that's a vital quality of life decision. 

As for the last update, letting that highway off into a large traffic circle is probably the most compact setup available for the area.  They're an amazingly efficient interchange up to a certain volume of traffic! 
I don't have any problems with my computer keeping up, since it's a pretty powerful work-station.  But yeah a lot of my decision to limit my Custom Content intake is because I really don't have the time or patience to weed out faulty mods, so I'd rather include them one at a time and see how they go in a controlled way.
Also, it's kind of like having a cake that is all icing, to me.  The first mouthful is really rich but after that it gets a bit sickly... I kinda feel like that about Custom Content... it's far more enjoyable to introduce one at a time and marvel at how awesome it is, rather than just dump a whole big bag in at once and spend the next few months tryna figure it all out... you know?

Quote from: 976 on January 18, 2010, 11:55:37 PM
Well I missed a few nice update!
Yes... where have you been?  >:(


Haha jk, hope you like what's coming up!



5 weeks after the first plans for the new SimNation Highways Project was first proposed and published, the contracts had been signed and construction had begun.

It was a rolling process, where construction on approved projects would begin, while other projects were still waiting to be drafted in detail.
This served not only to help conceal the total cost of the project from tax payers (since there WAS no total project until it was well underway) but it also helped speed the project up and budget the expenses out.

Most importantly, however, was it kept the progress in line with SimNation time-lines.  Which while the general public went about their lives living in the illusion of free-will, was absolutely paramount to local government who knew better.



The opening ceremony was held on the 18th of September, 1990, and involved the councillors and heads of the various groups involved in the project moving the first sods of dirt and posing for the media.  It was broadcast fairly extensively throughout the media, and was in general met with a mixture of people hating progress and people welcoming business growth, as is often the case with any new project.



The first project to be started (and to host the opening ceremony) was the eastern end of the Western Mountain Highway.



It began with the resumption of several houses and businesses in the path of the project, and of course Noel's Cherry Orchard that sat squarely in the path of the intersection.  There were very few protests, as the amount paid for the properties was the market value of the properties, a variable "discomfort" payment (which depended directly on the amount of protest each property put forward), plus all relocation costs... a payment that would never have been made by a buyer of the properties had they gone on the market voluntarilly.



The roads were then graded two weeks after that, with the ground works for the actual highway itself being commenced in parallel.



The next phase was the asphalting of the graded roads, and a more accurate grading of the intersection itself.



We'll come back and see how they're doing in a few months.
Meanwhile the highway began clearing procedures further to the west, at the Maynard Road intersection.



Council was very pleased with the progress made in two short months.
We're on schedule, and everything's looking like it's going to proceed very smoothly so far.

canyonjumper

Excellent update! The construction of the roads reminds me of Tarkusian Cities, Alex's (Tarkus) MD.

             -Jordan
I'm the one who jumped across the Grand Canyon... and lived.

RickD

Great MD. I admire to what extend you take the natural growth approach. I tried it several times myself but just couldn't stick to it. My playing style is completely different.
My name is Raphael.
Visit my MD: Empire Bay (My old MD: Santa Barbara County)