Harrington, a sc4 natural growth CJ

[89James89]

Thought I would start posting this over here as well given that I haven't posted anything here in while. The first 9 entries can be found here https://community.simtropolis.com/journals/journal/5669-harrington-a-natural-growth-sc4-cj/ and I'll post entry 10 here as a starting point!

Hope you all enjoy!


Entry 10: Coastal Communities Part 1, Farend
 
So, I know that I said that we'll be taking a look at the other administrative regions around Harrington today but turns out were not doing that in the end. Instead were going too visit Farend, a small little settlement up north, accessible only by boat via this old harbour.



 
As you can see from the initial look of the place, its a pretty quiet and laid back and moving up from the docks, the laid back feeling is more present (quite literally in this case seeing as they have a hot spring pool in the middle of town).



 
Apparently this laid back approach to life comes from literally not caring what everyone back in Harrington thinks (or wants them to do), which, seeing as they are bit of a journey away, and accessible only by boat, is fairly understandable.
 
The houses up here are pretty nice though, a lot of A frames and log cabins and they seem to have a much more community feel as well (which is probably why I keep getting weird looks) as these lots with multiple houses on them show.



 
As we get towards the edge of the town though we catch a glimpse of the overriding industry and main export of the area (most of which gets shipped into Harrington as a tax of some sort), lumber.



 
Processed mainly at this large sawmill and timber yard, the abundance of trees that grow up here in the foothills of the nearby mountain range has meant that the town has seen quite a lot of success (and also why everything is made of wood) and several of these logging operations can be seen in the area, supporting the sawmill and also clearing the way for the, much less prevalent but still needed farmland





 
Also unlike many of the other areas in the region, where growth is usually in pockets and lots of little villages and hamlets are everywhere up here it seems to just be one meandering mess with these cabins and the needed farmland everywhere where there aren't trees. Still, its nice and a pleasant change from Harrington.



 
So, to finish this entry off we have a look at the region where, as you can see we've explored a little bit more than we had doen last time, hitting some fairly large mountains in the north (Farend is in the top coastal area if you couldn't tell).


 
And that's it. Next time we'll probably try and take a look at another of these coastal communities, though, given that we've done something completely different this time than what I assumed we'd be doing last time, who knows!
Till next time!
 
(OOC: Now some of you may have noticed that before I'd said that I didn't really have that much interest in MMP's and creating scenes in this CJ, mainly focussing it on growth and continuous development and whilst that is still true, I got bit with the MMP bug and also figured that this area would never probably see that much growth so it could be justified. Also, apologies for the unfisniehd tiles in the regional view. Terraforming a region by hand is both a rewarding and fun process, however its also a very continuios one, as I'm sure most of you know. As such regional views will probably look a bit weird at times with some of the tiles!)

[evarburg]

Glad you got the MMP bug !  Especially with that kind of nice map, as it makes for a more rounded CJ.

[PaPa-J]

Nice CJ. I'll have to look it up over at ST and check out the beginning.

[vortext]

Nice to see you back at MDing. Looks lovely. 

[89James89]

So here we go again!

OOC: Right so I have a bit of a lesson for everyone. Apparently, it turns out that its a really bad idea to edit the config file of a region while you have the region open in game. A definite lesson in how to actually think about what your doing before you actually doing and also to make sure that you back up your regions every now and then.

Anyway, as you've probably guessed by now, this led to the unfortunate result of me wiping the entire map from existence. Bit of a bummer admittedly, still, from the ashes and all that so let's get stuck right back in, this time though, were going for a larger map (I'm seriously just kidding myself though, there's no way in hell I'm going to probably fill it up.), being 60x50 pixels (so 3000 square kilometres), but this time all in medium tiles rather than large so I can see how each of the settlements is really growing (I like seeing everything as an individual settlement so not being able to tell how many people were living in each of the villages in the old map was annoying me a bit). There's also a small chance I may have got bitten a bit by the whole MMP bug though, the plan is to keep this a bit minimal.

Right here we go!

Replies:

Thanks everyone for the likes! Below are the individual replies to the comments!

evaburg: Thanks and I think I agree with you, its nice to be able to add the little details you wouldn't have otherwise.

PaPa-J: Thanks, though I may have just accidently negated that need lol.

vortex: Hey vortex, thanks for the kind words and the welcome back, its nice to be CJing again, didn't realise how much I'd actually missed playing city building games!


Entry 11: Harrington, The Beginning (mk3)
Haven't we been here before?

So, welcome one and all to our new home, the Region of Harrington., a very sparsely populated but hospitable land and today, were going to visit the principal settlement of the area, Harrington.

Discovered and founded a little while back at the most sensible place for a sheltered harbour on the banks of the river Harring, this place has quickly become the main landing place for new settlers, with most of people in the region having passed through this harbour below.


Built to take advantage both of the natural harbour and the fish in the area we have a good staging point for this growing community, centred mainly around this church in the centre of the town where folks usually gather for important community events, both the working class that live around the church itself


Or the rich folk, living above the harbour overlooking their various enterprises.


As well as the bustling centre of town with the church and the farmers market, the town also boasts a large fete on the edge of the town where the housing gives way to farms.


Lots and lots of farms.


Other than that its your usual little town nestled amongst the trees with a couple of creeks like this one to give some points of interest.


Along with this little ford which, although fairly picturesque and a always fun to watch people try and drive through in the rainy months, is promptly becoming a bit of an issue, given that more and more traffic is heading out and in from the surrounding farms.


Still, it's a nice quiet place to live, and the people seem happy, not that they have that much choice, given that no one seems to really remember where the nearest actual settlement outside of the Harrington region but nevermind, they seem to have accepted that this is there lot in life.


And that's everything there is about Harrington town, next up we'll have a look at some of the other small settlements that can be found around here.

Till next time!

[evarburg]

I look forward to seeing the regional development and what it might do to that peaceful little city -- who knows ? :-)

[c.p.]

Nice little town.  I especially like the waterfront.

[PaPa-J]

The water front looks rather cozy.

[89James89]

Replies:

evarburg: Thanks and glad your looking forward to it. Your Cj's always been a brilliant inspiration for me and I assume, a lot of other people!

c.p.: Thanks, waterfronts are always tricky to do so when they come out well its always rewarding!

PaPa-J: Glad you like though be warned, that cosy waterfront is pretty noisy most of the time!



Entry 12: Smallbay

So, welcome back and today were going to take a trip out of Harrington, along the bay towards the tiny village of Smallbay., which, although the people of Harrington claim that they're town is, was actually the first settlement in the region.

Located about 5 or so Km away from Harrington, we have to take a boat to get there seeing as no roads or tracks exist between the two, still, this lets us see some of the features of the bay such as Pinerock Island, an island plateau of pine trees and birds and not much else past one of the two river mouths we see on the trip.


Moving past the second of the river mouths (both of which have yet to actually receive a name) we get a look at the first sign of habitation since the journey began, in this case the old beacon which served as a lighthouse. Or at least it did right up until the point where a ferry nearly ran aground and a much taller lighthouse was decided on. Still this one still sits on the end of one side of the bay and operates at night.



Coming around the beacon point we enter the small bay flanked by the much newer and more efficient lighthouse sat on Guidance Rock. You can also see some of the houses that make up the small settlement here as well, before we actually get to the docks.



And here we are, arriving at the tiny harbour of Smallbay. As you can see from the look of it, its a pretty simple place with a simple port for small cargo ships and a small landing for the ferries on which the two settlements rely. Its also very evident why this place was used as a stop over for the settlement of Harrington itself, the bay has never been able to support the ships that the town has needed while it grew.



The small town feel doesn't stop there though, this is the centre of it all, a far cry from the large church and commercial area of Harrington but the residents of Smallbay don't



As you can see from the overview. The town is very spread out with most of the residents fishing for a living or working on the two farms that exist here, owned by two wealthy landowners who made there mark farming in the initial stages of the two settlements, despite the small sizes of their estates.



And here's a aerial view of the place, showing just how small the bay and town are and also the gap leading to the area where Harrington resides.



Speaking on which, here's a map of the area which we travelled through to get from Harrington to Smallbay and with it the end of this entry!


Till next time!

[PaPa-J]

Beautifully done, well put together.

[evarburg]

I really like that map !  So many possibilities to creat wonderful vignettes... (I can see a woodman's cabin, here or there, with its generator, its well, its moored little boat and a philosophical fisherman fishing...  )

[89James89]

Replies:

PaPa-J: Thanks! Glad your enjoying it!

evarburg: Thanks, I love the whole terraforming a map portion of the game so I'm glad its paying off. As for the scenes that you described we do actually have some fishermen in Smallbay I just didn't take a screenshot of them! Fear not though as I've included one in this entry just for you!

Entry 13: Fittingly Unlucky!

So, welcome back to Harrington where we have some interesting developments that might not have gone totally to plan. You see, last time when we were visiting Smallbay, apparently a small group of people in Harrington were discussing the idea of moving their business enterprises to another purpose built area, complete with a new port and all.
Anyuway, they had found some suitable land and all so, given that pretty much any land is up for grabs around here if you build on it they quickly did, You see as a bit of a outlay for the plan it was fairly simple. One side of the part of the bay they'd chosen was enticing for the factory owners of the group as it had a lot of flat land and was perfect for a load of factories and a decent sized port for the area. The other side of the bay however didn't have the coastline to support a port and as such would be used for farming and production to process in the factories.And both would be close neough to Harrignton to be viable as a workplace by ways of the local ferries.
Sounds likes a plan right?

Well apparently, wrong.

You see this is how the enterprise looks at the moment.

Eastbank with the port and some factories.


Westbank with the farmland.


As you can see it was a bit of a disaster. The whole thing is, at the moment surviving barely with a break even city balance. Add to that the rampant unemployment in Eastbank, with people arriving to live in the small prefabs that the companies have built, only to find the jobs taken by people from out of town and little to no interest in developing the rest of the industrial space.

Meanwhile in Westbank, there just isn't any demand for anything and a unstable power supply means that its prone to rolling blackouts every now and then.

Certainly not the roaring success they were hoping for!

Now, as luck would have it (after they finished snickering at the failure of the enterprise anyway), the Harrington Town Council had seen the benefits of having an actual port to export the surplus stuff they didn't need and, despite the constant assurances of Mr Goodship, the current owner of the port in Harrington, anyone with half a brain could see that the small port there would become overwhelmed eventually. No, better to get ahead of the game with this one and as such they came up with a plan that would hopefully help in struggling enterprise in the form of a land based road (used in the most liberal of terms as you'll soon see) connection, starting off, of course with a ferry link to the other side of the river Harring.


Moving on into the first of Harringtons satellite settlements, Kinsen, which, although still beholden to the whims of Harrignton Town Council, has its own small council formed of a few influential and slightly questionable people. As such, you'll be able to see below that providing you have the right amount of money, you can build whatever you want pretty much anywhere you want. At least the journey to work is pretty short for the most part!


Unfortunately, pretty much everything else is short as well, including healthcare and education which, is probably not the best thing given that somebody had the brainwave of providing a place for everyone to dispose of their rubbish (for a price of course).


Don't you just love the smell of burning plastic in the morning!
Other than that there's not that much in Kinsen, with a few farms, giving the still growing and questionable Kinsen a very wide berth, as the planned road winds its way towards The Banks (as we'll refer to East and West bank) having completely lost its credibility as an actual road, shortly after leaving Kinsen.


Then going on to completely disappear as it enters the area known as Needle Point where, some bright spark decided that the construction of a lighthouse on the outcrop here was a better use of the towns money and time.


Needless to say, promises were made to The Banks that this would only be a small delay and necessary for the safe functioning of the upcoming port.
That however was several years ago now and since then, the tiny village of Needle Point, numbering just over 100 people making it significantly smaller than both The Banks and Smallbay, has received more funding than the road link has.



Still, there's hope yet, apparently someone has recently found the agreement documents which were being used to prop up a dodgy table leg so we'll have to see what comes of that!

Up until that point however, I guess we'll just plod on as usual, much like these fishermen in Smallbay are.


Also here's a updated regional view so you can see where the new developments are (and because frankly, I love regional views).


Till next time!

(OOC: So this was a bit of a weird one, I started Eastbank with the full expectation of a normal town growing up as usual but it didn't happen. Basically all the demand is completely messed up. No idea why as the other tiles are fine but I have a couple of ideas to try and solve it so we'll have to see.
At least it makes for a interesting and unexpected twist to the narrative I thought we were going to go with.)

[evarburg]

Harrowing news from Harrington ! As for why, hum. I am surprised to see connection arrows at the end of your streets, at the edges of the map ; is that a feature of a new-new NAM I haven't noticed ? The last time I played a region (OK, like, three years ago...) I had a few streets on the edges, but no arrow (and I hadn't put in the thingamajig that hides them when you want to take a picture). If they DO connect, then it's not that.

The absence or paucity of services may be, on the other hand. You certainly know there are inexpensive small clinics and schools, as well as police and fire services ? Custom, of course. Small, but with a decent coverage. Like CSX Day Clinic. Or Shmails Small Clinics ; (he even has a church functioning as a clinic (Stardog Church) ; also very pretty to boot, BarbyW BLS Old Alberts Muti clinic. For Police & Fire, Paeng has done a pretty set with three of each (1x1, 1x2, 1x3) to go with PEG MTP sets (but you don't need to use MTP to get them), that are perfect for beginning villages and smalltowns, very efficient, very inexpensive. *not a cheat, not a cheat !*  For schools, there is a nifty modern option, ABCVs School of the Air (turn on, tune in [to the radio], be educated); but also BLaM Village Elementary School ; or you can always go and check the PEG MTP sets, to which both Paeng and SBCVs were regular contributors (there is full MTP school package :elementary, high school and college for rural areas.) etc. Of course it is an investment -- 500 $ for the clinics, but it pays in the long run (even in the middle run !). I always resort to them when I begin a tile, and they help a lot.

Keep on keeping us apprised !

PS : And Thanks For the Fish.

[brick_mortimer]

...I am surprised to see connection arrows at the end of your streets, at the edges of the map ; is that a feature of a new-new NAM I haven't noticed ? The last time I played a region (OK, like, three years ago...) I had a few streets on the edges, but no arrow (and I hadn't put in the thingamajig that hides them when you want to take a picture). If they DO connect, then it's not that...

Hi Evarburg,

There's a trick to make neighbour connections with streets.
You do need the NAM (SAM and Underground Rail), but it's not a 'feature'.

Before I continue, this is NOT my invention or discovery
I picked it up from smileymk's excellent MD Realistic Cities For Dummies (which sadly stopped due to force majeur )

Step 1: Make a neighbour connection with a road. 2 tiles sticking out (or in ) is enough.
Step 2: Look in the Underground Railroad [...] Puzzle Pieces menu (below STR) for the "Curved Rail under Straight Road" piece (about 10 tabs in the menu)
Step 3: Plop this piece under the neighbour connection from step 1, making sure the overhanging road part of the puzzel piece is sticking out of the city tile.
Step 4: Buldoze the road tile next to the connection arrow ("inland" so to speak) so only the arrow remains.
Step 5: Place the SAM starting piece of your choice under the arrow.
Step 6: Draw out the street into your city.
Step 7: Repeat steps 1 - 6 on the other side with the same SAM starting piece (you should see a normal road connection when you open the neighbouring city)

You can, of course, remove the arrows with the hide arrows thingamajig to make nice pictures 

Btw, I really like P.R. Crastina's Travels 
Sadly I haven't found the time to comment, but I always "like" 

PS: 89James89 I like Harrington, a sc4 natural growth CJ as well of course 
Funny thing, I discovered the CJ on Simtropolis at about the same time you opened this MD on devotion.
But, same story as with P.R. Crastina, time to "like" but almost no time to reply due to RL... 

[mattb325]

Looking good.  It's so interesting to see a region view with such an organic shape . Hopefully the demand issues will sort themselves out for you as regional development continues 

[89James89]

Replies:

evarburg: I'm honestly not too sure what has messed the demand up in the tile but I'm not really that bothered, adds something a bit different! Services wise your right I do have a load of small ones but narratively wise, I didn't see the area having invested in any given the purpose of it. Don't worry though you can still be Edumacted in Harrington Town itself!

As for the dirt track at the tile edge its a illusion lol caused by the SAM type of the peg dirt road. Essentially, if you create a road connection as normal, then delete everything but the actual edge tile, then hook it up with the PEG dirt track, the model of the dirt track will go right up to the edge of the map (or near enough). Technically you still have the road connection there as well the arrow but it looks like a street connection. Not sure if it works with any other type though I'm afraid.

Oh and np with the fish! I hope your enjoyed the fishing trip!

brick_mortimer: Glad your enjoying the CJ and took the time to take a look at it! Your connection  way sounds like a rather complicated way of doing it compared to the one I mentioned above but I imagine that yours works a bit better with how it looks visually as mine still has a tiny bit of the road showing.

mattb325: Well they kind of sorted themselves out as you'll see and I'm glad you like the regional view, always one of the best bits of sc4 for me!


Entry 14: Well it kind of worked!

So, getting right back into things, and with the agreement document finally having been found, we start off again in Needle Point, where you can see the village has grown a tiny bit since last time.


Heading back out of town we now have a small fork where you can head down the new track towards Eastbank, passing by the lovely looking place where apparently you can learn about the bee's in the clearing from an slightly obsessed Bee-keeper!


Keeping on track (awful pun intended) we pass through the tiny village of Batterbrook where there's a small stream that we need to ford. Luckily the weather and the time of year is on our side so no issues today!


Following the track on the other side of the ford we come across some usual sites here in Harrington with a load of roadside farming.


Right before we come up against the first real obstacle for the whole project, this river.


Too wide and deep to ford, but not exactly wide enough to install a ferry connection, we decided to build our very first bridge. A pretty simple affair really, just your very basic and uninteresting bridge. It does the job though.


Also in the above picture you can see that a small community has built up around the bridge, mainly made up of the people that had been bought in to construct the bridge and who had chosen to never leave, now working on the farms nearby.

Which finally brings us to our final destination, Eastbank and the whole point of the project. Below you can see how the connection has helped with the growth of the town, sure it now has a load of people here and the towns funds are all the better for it but the whole point of towns was to becoem a industrial hub and a port and unfortunately, due to how long the palce has stagnated industry wise, it would appear that there isn't any demands for it. Still, at least the town is making money again so its not all bad......


We think........

Oh and nearly forgot! Here's the customary regional view, in which you can see we have some more expansion that we haven't explored yet!


Till next time!

[kbieniu7]

Hi, 89James89! Always nice to see new MD's at forum!

There's a bunch of nice shots. I need to admit that I hadn't enough time to read all description in details, I really admit the shorelines and the region views. So...

(...) and because frankly, I love regional views (...)

... please, give more!

Regards!

[PaPa-J]

The Region view is outstanding, I love the looks of it.

[mattb325]

Glad things got sorted out and the mmp work along the river is charming 

[89James89]

Replies:

kbieniu7: Thanks glad your enjoying it and that your a fellow regional view addict!

PaPa-J: Thanks, lets hope it keeps looking good as we grow!

mattb325: Sorted out by be a bit strong theres still no industrial demand at all in the tile so I've no idea what's causing that. At leas the ports working now. Got to ship that 4 tonnes of cargo somehow lol!


Entry 15: Harrington Landscape Files 001

(OOC: So, a bit of a weird title today but it should make a bit of sense in a minute as you continue with this entry. You see, despite being sure that MMP's wouldn't feature heavily in this CJ, I appear to have been bitten by the MMP bug anyway and seeing as I like to see things develop and play at 1 speed a lot of the time, I find myself adding stuff while playing (Got to develop the region up a bit as it would get boring with you guys seeing the same things repeated every single entry). So here we have a look at pretty much nothing but the wild untamed lands of Harrington! I hope you enjoy)

Welcome back to Harrington, where, today, we'll take a look at some of the rather more untamed areas of the region in what I assume, will only be the first in many of these entries. There's not a lot to say so I'll just give every photo a small title and give any information when its needed.

Forrest glades break the vast forest Harrington is located in.


A lot of rivers can be found here, this one backing onto a nearby farm


Tiny tidal inlets are very common, this one up against housing in Harrington itself


Rocky Slopes line the valleys were slowly exploring


Another look at the previously mentioned Pine Rock


Finally, a look at a place recently found by hikers, some small lakes outside the scattered settlement of Rocky Bend (not actually mentioned or seen in the journal yet)




So that's the first entry dedicated to looking at the surroundings in Harrington rather than the growth and the people in the region. I hope you guys enjoy the slightly different entry!

Till next time!