Three Rivers Region

[kalanc69]

It's been a great four years! I've learned so much about creating custom content in the game, and I've seen so much beautiful scenery! Thanks for all the hard work you do for all of us SimCity addicts! SimCity just would NOT be the same without you!

[nekseb]

Happy Birthday 3RR! 

Each time I take a look at SC4Devotion my first look is at 3RR - your work is always amazing and I learned much about all the possibilitys in SC4.

Hope we have again 4 years (or better 4 * 4 years, then we have 20 years of 3RR)!!! 

[JoeST]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

[cubby420]

Happy belated Birthday as well! I haven't been around long, so I'm still sifting through the massive amount of great stuff 3RR has to offer.

[dedgren]

No, I haven't disappeared again...

A family matter came up, and we had to fly Heather off to her grandparents in Mississippi on just a few hours' notice.

While I'm distracted for a bit, I'll leave you with two things.  First, a little 3RR eye candy.


Smith River Cascades, South Perch Township

Second, a puzzle.  Attached to this post is a prototype ploppable seasonal tree file.  There are three seasons: spring/summer, fall and winter.  The plopped trees will cycle through these seasons without regard to the calendar and take a few years between changes.  Here's what it looks like over time.













The secret to aligning these to the game seasons is in the ksc4floraparameters or, depending on your Reader's XML file, floraparameters) property of the 6534284a e83e0437 16f00000 exemplar file.



I'm working on it, but I'd like to see what a fresh look might produce.  The test ploppable is here.



Oh, for those of you who concluded that the RKT5 approach was a dead end- I've had a ploppable seasonal tree cycle through 300 years of game time tonight, and it's still changing.

So who can figure out how to line the changes up with the seasons?  I'd like to think of all of you folks as a giant parallel processing computer- someone can figure this out.


David

577703

[joelyboy911]

Well I only just learned how to make an MMP (thanks for making the tut. by the way), so I can't help you fix it. 

It certainly is an excellent idea.

[stewart_garden]

David,

I have recently taken to lurking more and commenting infrequently, both because I haven't a lot of time and because I believe that if I don't have anything new to say then I am best to say nothing. 

However, I wanted to post here to congratulate you on four years of a very interesting project in 3RR and also to give a strong nod of encouragement to your latest seasonal trees project.  You continually push the boundaries of the game and it is because of you and people like you that SC4 remains fun, relevant and exciting to play.  I hope the community can find a way to make this latest idea work - it is one of those items on the "wouldn't it be great if ..." list.

My best wishes to you and all the 3RR regulars.

Stewart

[Toichus Maximus]

now THAT would be awesome. Glad to hear of the possibility.

[toja]

I played around with the ksc4FloraParameters this afternoon and this is what I've found out:

The first value (1000 in your file) controls the time-interval between the different states of the model. I've no idea why, but it seems as if it's measured in days*2.

The sixth value (7300 in your file) controls how long it takes to complete the whole cycle in days, so it should be 365 for seasonal trees.

I don't know if it's possible to have four states in the model-cycle ... with three models (the autumn-model at first) I would suggest to use 182 for the first value (~3 Month). The model should be plopped in late september...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY 3RR!

toja

[ldvger]

David-

Been lurking these past couple of weeks, busy with some RL work (yes, the paying kind, finally!) and playing with terrain mods for my new MD, but your questions about seasonal trees provokes me to post.

The first thought that comes to mind is maybe it's possible to create seasonal trees by "planting" them at the correct time of year, game time.  Right now your trees are taking several years to cycle through the seasons, but something is controlling when those cycles change.  Somewhere in the exemplar, perhaps in the string you highlighted, there is something that controls the duration of the cycles.  Obviously you need to find that controller and play around with it to see how to shorten the three cycles down to what is more realistic for what happens in RL.  If you can do that, then the trick would be to sync the trees with the game seasons, so the color up in fall, go bare in winter, and re-leaf in spring.

Try taking a look at the weather exemplar in the SinCity_1.dat.  Lets see if I have it's hex number lying around.  Ah, here it is: 6534284a 7a4a8458 1a2fdb6b.  This puppy has an effect on terrain textures, something I've just recently learned.  Evidently textures change slightly between summer and winter and are sync'd to the game seasons.  How this works I have not yet discovered and, for my purposes (so far), doesn't really matter.  However, you may be able to disassemble this exemplar and discover the mechanism that links graphic changes in game to the game clock, which you could then maybe apply to your seasonal trees.  

Other folks seem to have been able to time seasonal changes to occur at correct times.  I am thinking of snow mods that activate in winter months by the game clock.  That might be another avenue to explore.  I use PEG's seasonal trees in my cities and to tell the truth never noticed if they activate at the proper times of year, but I rarely run my game at anything other than "turtle" speed and the PEG trees seem to change quite often, so that's another resource to look at.  Jeronij also made seasonal trees, so look at his work, also.

Other than that, all I can tell you about revising exemplars is to experiment.  I've found I can make my default beaches wider and shallower in pitch by tweaking a string in the Terrain Properties exemplar...which I discovered by simple trial and error.  I found the same true about how the game displays bands of terrain textures is linked to a string that controls overall max and min terrain heights across the region (dependent also on how much elevation relief exists in a particular region).

I was initially intimidated about the idea of editing numbers and values I had no idea what they meant for fear of messing up my game, but if one takes the usual precaution of copyiny/renaming the exemplar first, I think you're pretty safe.  If you mess something up, you can always plug the original exemplar back in and discard your revised one.  Just be a good bookkeeper.

Good luck to you!  In the line of seasonal trees, I'd like to see some God Mode seasonal broadleaf forests.  As much as I love micro-managing my cities and landscapes, planting entire forests one tree at a time in Mayor Mode gets tedious.  Also on my wish list is more alternative tree controllers...

Lora/LD

[Andreas]

I might have found something else: the Flora Tuning Exemplar (6534284A,7A4A8458,1A2FDB6A) file has a property called "mnMonthsBetweenCellCoverage", which is set to 0x18 (= 24). IIRC, you once found that your seasonal trees only changes over a period of two years. I wonder if changing this property to 12 might change something?

[Jmouse]

I'm sorry to hear of Heather's hurried trip on family business. Such things are nearly always upsetting, so please let her know there are some 3RR regulars who are thinking of her and wishing her well in what must be a time of great stress.

Later...
Joan

[threestooges]

I'll second what Joan said, David. I'm sorry to hear that you had to fly out on such short notice, but I hope that things are going better now that you are down there. Being around family certainly helps in rough situations. Keep us posted on things.
-Matt

[frdrcklim]

Four more years ! Four more years !...

[dedgren]

Four more years!



Heh!  I knew I'd heard that before somewhere.  I know, though, it's the thought that counts.

* * *

I have spent much of the past week trying everything I can think of to crack the ploppable seasonal tree puzzle.  I'm pretty depressed, because I haven't gotten very far for all the work put into it.  I've tried and discarded about a gazillion (that's a 3RR trial and error techie term) different ideas.  What's really frustrating is that things I know were working 18 months ago don't work now.  Things hit a low point today when I thought I had corrupted my simcity_1.DAT file and had to reinstall the game from scratch.  It turned out that a completely innocent appearing file I'd created in my plugins folder was the culprit.  The moral of that is, don't...DON'T ever, in what you might think is the interest of efficiency, make "temporary" changes to exemplar properties in any of the game DAT files.  I guarantee you'll forget what you've done, and then every time something seems funny with how the game works, you'll feel like you've screwed your installation up.

Anyway...

I'm going to take a break from pounding away at this today (this is posted just after midnight Sunday morning, Alaska time) and head back to collaboration.  Watch this space...



...'cos Elvis is headed for bed.


David

581410

[threestooges]

As long as he's not leaving the building to do it. I'm sure you'll get it all figured out soon enough, especially with the folks we have around here. As for collaboration, I'll be keeping an eye out for new developments.
-Matt

[ldvger]

David-

Sometimes stepping away from what seems to be an unsolvable problem is exactly the right (and sometimes only) thing to do.  I've run into this many times, both in RL and here with SC4...seems I can't see the forest for the trees.  I think "burn out" also comes into play.  Taking a break and focusing on other aspects of the project, no matter what the project is, is often the best solution.

I understand completely your frustration and depression.  The PW/GW transition issue is one that does this to me every time I try to tackle it (and I've done so several times in the past and am coming up on yet another foray).  I think it helps to remember that solving game issues is a task we both manufacture and take upon ourselves, so in the overall picture of our lives, any failures we rack up are really very small change when compared with RL issues.  If you are like me in any way, it's sometimes hard to remember that...hey, it's just a game.  It's supposed to be fun and entertaining and relaxing.  If it stops being that, then maybe it's not the game that's the problem.

So yeah, take a break.  Play the game for a while, do some actual building and development.  Long before you started delving into the world of custom content, it was actually playing the game that made you a fan.  I'm doing this with my new MD, after spending weeks trying to untangle how to create my own terrain mod.  With help, I did learn a lot, enough to create my own mod, but I've spent enough time at it and it's time to get back to actually playing.  So my new region is using someone else's mod and it looks just fine.  

Lora/LD

[dedgren]

Two of these 3RR Regulars^*/Collaborators will be getting a quad today.  The legend at the bottom shows to whom the numbered quads are assigned.



[tabular type=4][head colspan=2]

Map Key

[/head]
[row][data]

#

[/data][data]

Collaborator

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

1

[/data][data]

Albus of Garaway

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

29

[/data][data]

Allan_Kuan_1992

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

2

[/data][data]

bakerton

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

3

[/data][data]

BarbyW

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

4

[/data][data]

superhands

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

5

[/data][data]

BigSlark

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

30

[/data][data]

CCFC

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

6

[/data][data]

Darmok

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

7

[/data][data]

deathtopumpkins

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

8

[/data][data]

caspervg

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

9

[/data][data]

dedgren

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

10

[/data][data]

ecoba

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

11

[/data][data]

Gaston

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

12

[/data][data]

Heinz

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

13

[/data][data]

girlfromverona

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

14

[/data][data]

io_bg

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

15

[/data][data]

Jmouse

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

16

[/data][data]

meldolion

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

17

[/data][data]

metarvo

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

18

[/data][data]

mightygoose

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

19

[/data][data]

Pat

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

20

[/data][data]

penguin_007

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

21

[/data][data]

pvarcoe

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

22

[/data][data]

Rayden

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

31

[/data][data]

rhizome21

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

23

[/data][data]

running naked in the snow

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

24

[/data][data]

Tarkus

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

25

[/data][data]

threestooges

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

26

[/data][data]

thundercrack83

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

27

[/data][data]

Toichus Maximus

[/data][/row]
[row][data]

28

[/data][data]

unkles27

[/data][/row]
[/tabular]

If you are on the list and there are any changes in your availability, please let me know ASAP.  If I've left you out, make some noise as well.  I'll be reposting the rules and other information over the course of the afternoon and evening.

Oh, and if you've ever had any desire to be a 3RR Collaborator, speak up.  This is a project that is open to everyone.  Give me some indication of what kind of quad (urban/small town/rural/some special quality or feature) you would like, and I'll see what I can do.

UPDATE:  Here are the rules as they were posted way back three years ago [linkie].  There'll be a few changes- I'll be posting them in a bit.

[tabular][row][data]Basically, my concept is this: I will maintain the entire region on my computer up here in Alaska.  As quads are identified for development, I will transfer them along with the basic files to set up a special nine quad development region.  The developer, who I will be calling the "Administrator/Planner," will then have a reasonable time to do an initial development of the quad.  Once that happens, the quad will be transferred back to me for incorporation into the region.  The developer will also be able to upload pics and information about the development into the 3RR thread.  Further development can then proceed at the pace the developer would like to set, although I would like to shoot for the region being entirely developed within about six months.  This length of time will likely be adjusted forwards or backwards based on actual experience.

Before a quad is sent out for development, I will complete basic terraforming, forestation with God mode and Mayor mode trees, and the placement of the basic road grid.  A relatively well detailed back story describing the development on the quad will also be provided.  Within the outlines of the back story and a few absolute rules the developer may then develop the quad as he or she would see fit.  I will serve as the central government, and provide regional planning assistance.  I may also impose from time to to time by requiring acceptance of a YIMBY/NIMBY item or facility in a quad...we'll see how that works out.

Here are the rules that will apply across the board:

1.  The Adminstrator/Planner and I will negotiate and agree on the contents of a plug-in folder and mods to be used before development begins.  The developer will be responsible for keeping track of what is used in for describing it to the general public on the 3RR thread.

2.  Road, highway and rail entrance and exit points to and from the quad will not be changed or added to by the developer absent negotiation and agreement with me.

3.  Reforestation after trees are removed in the course of development will utilize trees that are similar to the ones removed.  All deciduous trees will be in the form of seasonal trees wherever practical.

4.  Cycledogg's "Columbus terrain mod" will be used in every quad.

5.  Timotheus4's "Edmonton water mod" and Pegasus' "Brigantine water mod" will be used in every quad where water appears.

6.  Only site or project specific terraforming may be done.  Any terraforming that changes a grid square on the edge of a quad will be done only after negotiation and agreement between the developer and me.

7.  A "Slope mod" will be used that limits maximum rail grades to 3%, maximum elevated highway grades to 5%, maximum highway grades to 7%, maximum avenue and road grades to 10%, and maximum street grades to 12%.

8.  The latest version of the NAM shall be used.

9.  Other standards I announce from time to time will be followed absent negotiation and agreement between the developer and me.[/data][/row][/tabular]

Thanks, as always, for everyone's continued interest in this project.


David

^* Each collaborator is a 3RR Regulator, and so is anyone who's posted here, or over at 3RR-ST or on the 3RR Blog, at least once.

581707

[dedgren]

This is the first in a number of past posts that will reposted today for your review and then be incorporated into the comprehensive backstory section of 3RR [linkie], hopefully also completed today.  I apologize for the bumping in advance, and note that the first collaboration announcement made earlier today is here [linkie].

Originally posted April 4, 2007 [linkie]
[tabular][row][data]Sovereignty and Governance

Three Rivers Region is self-governing under the Treaty of 1839 with Canada and the United States.  The region enjoys close relations with both countries, but strictly observes its national motto:

Vos mens vestri res quod nos mos mens nostrum res.

which loosely translates as, "You mind your business and we'll mind ours."

Diplomatic relations are maintained with most of the democratic nations of the world, but 3RR has no embassies in other countries.  It welcomes other nations, however, to maintain diplomats in the region.  3RR's foreign policy, to the extent it has one, is modeled on that of the Duchy of Grand Fenwick [linkie].  The governmental and administrative center of 3RR is the city of Pineshore.

Three Rivers Region is governed by a 110 member Assembly.  One member is elected from each of 3RR's 64 election districts, which coincide with the boundaries of the region's townships.  Each of 3RR's 33 cities except Pineshore elects an additional at-large member.  Pineshore elects 13 further members from wards that have roughly equal population to each other.  The Assembly sits at Pineshore every other year during the month of June.  It elects at the start of each term a chair and vice-chair, who then lead and represent the Assembly until the start of the next term.  While there are not political parties per se in the region, its politicians tend to fall along traditional liberal and conservative lines.  Broadly put, the Assembly has pursued relatively liberal social and domestic policies for the last 20 years, but tends to be centrist-right as to world issues and relations with other countries.  The region has no military, but posts observers with both the United States and Canadian armed forces for purposes of coordination.  The voting age in 3RR is 18 if not otherwise disqualified (commission of a felony, incarceration and incompetence are three disqualifiers), and participation rates in most elections runs about 85-90% of eligible voters.

The day-to-day governance of Three Rivers Region is in the hands of an official appointed by the Assembly Chair known as the Regional Administrator.  [to be written]

Three Rivers Region is divided into 64 named townships of equal size.  These townships have no governmental function, serving purely as entities created in connection with the orderly subdivision of the region's land area.  The concept of a "section" of land was developed under the Land Ordinance of 1785 [linkie], a law adopted by the United States to provide for the surveying, division and ultimate disposal to the general public of the vast lands of the Northwest Territory, an area consisting of the present-day states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin and part of Minnesota [linkie].



Three Rivers Region lies at the westernmost extent of these lands, and the one-square mile section was adopted there as well.

Sections are organized into "survey townships" [linkie] under the Public Land Survey System [linkie] adopted in the United States pursuant to the Land Ordinance of 1785.  These townships are formed from squares of 25 sections (five on a side) or, as is far more often the case, 36 sections (six on a side).  Here is a diagram of a notional 36 section township.



This form of township should not be confused with the "civil township" [linkie], a unit of local government subordinate to counties [linkie] in some of the United States.  Rather, it is just a consistent grouping of sections that provides for uniform numbering and for specific sections (for example, section 16 for public schools) to be dedicated for public purposes.  The sections of a given township were usually surveyed all at the same time.  The map boundaries between sections were required to be deemed "section-line easements" reserved for the future construction of public roads and other infrastructure.  Establishing these easements, usually 50 feet wide centered on the boundary, resulted in the one-mile square pattern of road development that characterizes 3RR, the U.S. midwest and plains states, and the great plains provinces of Canada, which were laid out in mile-square sections under a similar scheme, the Dominion Land Survey [linkie].

The rural areas of Three Rivers Region suitable for agriculture were laid out in this grid pattern beginning in the 1830s and consequently land development has occurred there pretty much as it did in the nearby states and provinces.  In 3RR, however, the first post-independence government, in 1842, rejected the idea of the 36 section township and instead adopted the 25 section township as more consistent with the region's small size (40 miles by 40 miles).  Thus, Three Rivers Region is divided into 64 survey townships five miles on a side, as shown here.



Each of these townships has a unique name, generally taken from a major physical feature found within it.  The townships each further contain four equal-size quadrants, called quads, two and one-half miles on a side.  This, of course, corresponds with the "large city" found in SC4.  The Three Rivers Region Geological Service ("3RRGS") bases its mapping on the quads, which are titled by taking the name of the underlying township (e.g.: "Low Light") and appending the two-letter directional abbreviation (i.e.: NW=northwest, SW=southwest, NE=northeast, and SE=southeast) corresponding to the location of the quadrant in the township.  Thus, the northeast quad in Low Light township is named "Low Light-NE."

The region, based on its size, is not divided into counties.  The sub-regional units of local government within 3RR are the city, town and village.  Every one of these units of government has its own post office and unique postal code [linkie].  Pineshore, due to its size, currently has 18 different postal codes.  Cities are incorporated units of local government established either under a city charter [linkie] or under provisions of the 3RR Codified Laws (3RR C.L.).  In order to incorporate as a city, a locality must have a certain number of inhabitants, currently 10,000.  This number was as low as 300 in the mid-1800s and rose gradually over the subsequent years, which accounts for the many cities in the region that have less than 10,000 in population today.  Cities are formed based on a majority vote of all of the eligible persons residing within the proposed city limits, which, if successful, is followed by a petition to the Assembly.  Each city is required to have an elected Mayor and a Board of Aldermen consisting of at least five elected members.  Generally, cities have a broad range of local power, to include the power to tax and budget, and each, as noted, has one or more elected members on the Assembly.  The 33 current cities of Three Rivers region are Amherst, Aurora, Baudette, Black Earth, Boissevain, Brooks Ferry, Carson Bluff, Cook, Des Plaines, East Pineshore, Ellisport, Falls City, Grand Valley, Haypoint, Highland, Independence, Marchand, Meriden, Montgomery, Oak Point, Ottawa, Pineshore, Pvarcoe, Richwood, Shaw, South Shore, Stewart, Truman, Waldorf, Warren, Willoughby, Wolf Lake, and Wood Ridge.

A location map is at the end of this section.

Towns are incorporated units of local government that are much like cities, but they do not have the power to tax.  The powers they do exercise are specified in the 3RR C.L.  Funds for town budgets are appropriated by the 3RR Assembly under a formula based a floor amount plus an increment that varies by population size.  Towns also have an elected Mayor and Board of Aldermen, the latter must be at least at least three in number.  There is no minimum size requirement for the formation of a town, and, as with cities, such is based on a majority vote of the eligible residents within the proposed town limits followed by the submission of a petition to the Assembly.  Three Rivers Region currently has 16 towns: Avon, Duck Bay, Ellsworth, Geneva, Grass Prairie, Iona, Long Beach, Loon Lake, Marius Corners, Oak Center, Prater Springs, Riverview, Rushford, Stockholm, Whitehall, and Woodstock.

Villages are unincorporated units of local government but have defined limits.  Village governments, which consist of an elected mayor and volunteer planning commission, have only the powers granted in the 3RR C.L. to regulate local land use and provide specified services, such a community water and sewer system.  Funds for village governmental operations are appropriated by the Assembly using much the same formula as for towns.  Villages are formed based on the Assembly's decision on a petition signed by 35% or more of the persons eligible to vote living within the proposed limits.  There are 16 current villages in 3RR.  They are Dodge Center, Fox Rapids, Hanska, Harwill, Hope, Lakeview, Le Sueur, Meachem, New Sweden, Portis, Spring Grove, Travis, Walnut Grove, Weaver, Wheaton, and White Rock.

The region also has recognized "unincorporated places," which are usually small rural urbanized areas that have some historical affinity among its residents.  These places usually have a post office and its own unique postal code.  There are five current unincorporated places in 3RR: Oxbow, Thunder Bay, Kerrick, Truro, and Ash Creek.

Here is a location map of 3RR's cities, towns, villages, and places.



Click here for a large-size map [linkie], which will open in a new window (843 kb).

Population and Demographics

Three Rivers Region has a population based on the year 2000^* census of 463,880 inhabitants.  All but about 9,500 residents live in one of the urbanized localities noted in the previous section.



Here's the same table sorted by population.



The only urban place in Three Rivers Region of any appreciable size is the city of Pineshore, which has a total population (2000) of 125,983 inhabitants.  Pineshore is situated in the south-center of the region at the mouths of the Grand and Wind Rivers.



Pineshore contains just over 27% of the region's population.  Suburban areas surrounding the city have a combined population of about another 104,000 people, almost 22.5% of total population.



Together, Pineshore and its suburbs have 229,881 residents, just slightly less that half the population of Three Rivers Region.  Small cities, towns and villages spread across the rest of the region bring the area's total population to 463,880.  The next table breaks out this total by locality type.



The percentages of each locality type are summarized on the following chart.



Three Rivers Region, then, has a population, for all its remoteness, that is by and large urbanized, in that about 94% of it, all but 28,384 persons, live in cities and towns.  Calculated based on land area, 3RR has a population of almost exactly 290 persons per square mile/113 per square kilometer.  This is just slightly less that the U.S. state of Florida.  By comparison, Minnesota, the state bordering 3RR on the U.S. side, has a population density of about 61 persons per square mile/23 per kilometer.  Manitoba, the Canadian province to the northwest, has a population density of five persons per square mile/2 per square kilometer, Ontario, to the northeast, has about 33.3 persons per square mile/12.6 per square kilometer.  It is thus seen that the region is an island of fairly dense settlement in a sparsely inhabited surrounding area- a situation consistent with 3RR more or less being a city-state.

Of other demographic note, the region's population growth is essentially flat, with deaths and a small outmigration roughly equaling births since the 1980s.  Life expectancy is substantially longer than the North American average at 89 years for women and 86.5 years for men.

^* Results from the 2010 decennial population census, which is currently ongoing, will be available in late June or early July of this year. [/data][/row][/tabular]



David

581752

[dedgren]

The second in a series of past posts that I'm reposted today to get everyone on the same sheet of music for collaboration.  The posts will then be incorporated into the comprehensive backstory section of 3RR [linkie].  The start of collaboration posting today is here [linkie].

Originally posted February 28, 2007 [linkie]
[tabular][row][data]Transportation

   Overview:  As has already been noted ("You can't get to Kenora without changing canoes in Pineshore"), Three Rivers Region, following initial exploration, almost immediately became a significant transportation hub for the surrounding area.  Much of early Pineshore along the banks of the Grand River was given over to warehousing, as area fur trappers would bring by canoe, and later riverboat, their season's production, sell it, and leave laden with stores and supplies either locally produced or brought in from the Great Lakes up the Rainy River.  The physical remoteness of the area sharply limited overland travel and the transporting of goods much beyond the region in the early years.  The first rude roads, often of corduroy construction [linkie] due to the frequent low and swampy areas of the terrain, reached the area from Duluth in the late 1830s and were then extended on to the Red River Valley and Winnepeg in the 1840s.[/color]  Railroads reached Three Rivers Region in the 1850s, bringing a new era of economic growth along with a whole host of communicable diseases theretofore unknown to the region.  Rails quickly connected the region to the growing cities of the U.S. midwest and Canadian plains.  It is locally contended that poutine, an incomprehensible mixture of fried potatoes, gravy and cheese curds,



was invented in Pineshore in 1863 as a way of efficiently feeding hungry railroad crews and reducing the growing surplus of locally produced agricultural products.  Poutine was honored by being designated as the region's official convenience food in 1993 and is a main dish at all governmental functions where food is served.  The advent of the automobile increased Three Rivers Region's links with the heartland of North America, and truck and rail transport now surpass, but not by much, shipments of goods and commodities through 3RR's port city of Falls City, which, as noted, in 1970 became the westernmost terminus of the St. Lawrence Seaway System [linkie- please note that the Wikipedia article inexplicably fails to note this information].  Three Rivers Region International Airport has become a major hub for several airlines, and its airfreight capacity now rivals cities like Memphis, Tennessee.

  The Three Rivers Region Department of Transportation ("3RRDOT"):  This department of the region's government has the mission of providing access to fast, safe and efficient means of transportation for the region's residents and to develop and facilitate the most productive use of the region's transportation infrastructure and other resources in support of business and commerce.  The department is further organized into four divisions:  Roads and Highways, Rail Transport, Ports and Waterways, and Air Transport Division.

      Roads and Highways Division.  This division is charged with responsibility for the planning, construction and maintenance of the region's roads and highways.


R-43 heads south toward the DeLong Mountains

The roads and highways under the purview of 3RRDOT are classified as follows:

1.  Freeways.  Freeways are limited-access divided highways intended to move large numbers of vehicles a) longer distances around the region; and b) into and out of the urbanized area of Pineshore and its suburbs.


F-28 west along the Wind River

Generally, the 3RR freeway system consists of radial "spokes" extending out from Pineshore's city center, an inner beltway encircling Pineshore's central business district, several urban "spurs," and two other "ring" roads around the city at about five and fifteen miles beyond the city limits (actually they each will extend, if ever fully completed, about three-quarters of the way around, with the other quarter being the Hotham Inlet).  The region's freeway system also connects with U.S. Interstate 98 (the "Rooftop Freeway") and the joint U.S.-Canadian "Duluth-Winnipeg Freeway", which in the 'states is signed as Interstate 41.  3RRDOT, as a courtesy to its neighbor, "dual-signs" its connecting freeways with the U.S Interstate shields.[/color]

   
   

Canada, of course, has never built its leg of this latter road.

3RR has about 120 miles/192 kilometers of completed freeways.  Many were built in the 1970s and 1980s, in particular the ones in Pineshore, and are in need of reconstruction to meet current capacity needs and to bring them to modern design standards.  Pineshore is also the site of the famous (or infamous, depending on your position) battle over the "Riverfront Freeway" along the western shore of the Grand River through a district of historic (or old, run-down and unsightly, again depending on your position) warehouses.  This link (unimportant or vital...your position, etc.) has been blocked for about 15 years but, in light of the current traffic congestion problems, resistance to the project (along with the warehouses themselves) appears to be crumbling.  If every mile of freeway planned by 3RRDOT was built, the system would total about 275 miles/440 kilometers in length.  Occasional governmental proposals to impose tolls on some freeway stretches to assist in raising funds to complete the system have led to impeachment, and sometimes worse...  Freeways run within a right-of-way of 200 to 300 feet/60 to 90 meters, with the smaller width usually being located in urbanized areas.  Generally, freeways have six lanes (three in either direction), but some rural mileage is only four lane (two in either direction).

The region's freeways are numbered with principal freeways being two digits- even numbers indicated freeways running primarily east-west and odd numbers are assigned to those running more-or-less north-south.

     

Beltways, spurs and ring freeways are assigned three-digit numbers, with the last two digits referring to the principal freeway with which the freeway in question is most closely associated.  Beltways and rings start with an even number, thus the "437 Freeway" that rings the Pineshore suburbs on the south shore of the Wind River is one of these two types designed mainly to serve as a bypass in connection with the "37 Freeway."  Spurs, on the other hand, start with odd numbers, thus the spur "121 Freeway" is the freeway branching off of the "21 Freeway" to allow direct access to the City of Aurora.  Much like U.S. Interstates are called "I" followed by the route number for short (e.g. "I-98," "I-41"), 3RR's freeways are called "F" followed by the route number.  Thus, the "60 Freeway" is generally referred to as "F-60."

2.  Primary Roads.  Primary roads are the region's main short-trip traffic carriers, although some serve as the principal highway to more remote areas of the region where traffic counts do not justify building a freeway.  Some of 3RR's freeways have replaced a corresponding primary road serving the same corridor, for example F-28 and R-6, but 2RRDOT has not followed the usual practice of its U.S. neighbor of "de-commissioning" the older route.  The primary roads in many parts of the region essentially feed long-trip traffic onto the freeways, and then again carries that traffic as it exits near its destination.  There are currently just over 400 miles/640 kilometers of roads in the primary road system.


R-4 crests a hill with Gunsight Mountain just across the 3RR/Ontario border in the distance

The legislation creating primary roads dates back to the 1920s, a time when the entire 3RRDOT was simply the "Bureau of Roads and Streets" and was run from two offices in one of those warehouses now threatened by the Waterfront Freeway.  It called for[/color]

• ...a system of improved two lane roads, each lane of which shall be no narrower than nine feet, laid out as much as possible on the grid of existing rural roads, with no more than five miles to separate any two parallel primary roads.  Primary roads shall be constructed on a right-of-way no less than 50 feet in width.  The north-south primary roads shall be odd-numbered in one or two digits, with lower numbered routes beginning in the east of the region, and the east-west primary roads shall be even-numbered in one or two digits with lower-numbered routes beginning in the north of the region.  A primary road that is subordinate to another, such as one providing a route into a town or a cut-off shortening a round about distance, shall be three digits, with an odd number being the first digit, and with the controlling primary route's number being the last one or two digits, and with the middle digit being filled with "0" as necessary...

Here are two primary road route shields in use in the region.

     

All primary roads in 3RR are paved, and have between two and six lanes.  Several are divided and limited access and, except for the route number, indistinguishable from 3RR's freeways.  This is easier to understand when you know that every limited access highway in 3RR "signed" as a primary road has a "secret" "F" number, and is actually part of the freeway system.  This is done for no other reason than to rationalize the route numbering system, and not as part of some "black helicopter" conspiracy, as is believed by some less enlightened residents.

Currently, most two and three lane primary roads are located on 150 foot/48 meter wide rights-of-way, except in urban areas where the ROW generally remains 50 feet/16 meters.  New four and five lane roads are constructed on 200 foot/64 meter wide ROWs.  All divided primary roads, whether limited access or not, are on 300 foot/96 meter ROWs.  It is the policy of 3RRDOT that rights-of-way are kept clear of trees, brush and other obstructions, but clearing programs frequently lag behind Mother Nature's unlimited budget.

The major 3RR primary roads link up with Manitoba and Ontario's provincial and Minnesota state highway systems.  To the northwest, a 3RR primary road connects to Manitoba Route 12.

As for Ontario, the connection is to King's Highway 44

which, interestingly enough, does not connect to any other Ontario highway, as it crosses the border west into Manitoba as its way further north is barred by Lake of the Woods.  On the U.S. side, no federal highway reaches the border with Minnesota.  It is reached, though, by state route 11

which heads east to the border towns of International Falls [linkie] and Fort Frances [linkie], and west to the North Dakota border at the Red River of the North [linkie].  As Minnesota Route 11 would be a through route but for 3RR. it is "dual-signed" with several of the region's primary roads and "To" signs across the region.

3.  Secondary Roads.  Secondary roads are the region's local rural traffic carriers.  There are no secondary roads within the city limits of Pineshore, which has the responsibility under its charter for maintaining all streets and roads that are not in the freeway and primary systems.  Secondary roads are two lanes wide, may be paved or simply "improved" (chip seal, tarred, or graded and compacted gravel are all common) and are built, with a few wider exceptions, on 50 foot/16 meter wide rights-of-way.


S-527 crosses the prairie headed toward the Southern Range


S-546 just south of Low Light Hills

Secondary road numbers are three digits long and always begin with "5."  Odd-numbered secondary roads run north and south, running from lower to higher across the region from west to east.  Even-numbered secondary roads run east and west, running from lower to higher across the region from north to south.  Here are two secondary road route shields from the region.

     

There are about 1,100 miles (1,760 kilometers) of secondary roads in Three Rivers Region.

4.  Bridges and Tunnels.  The 3RRDOT also has the responsibility for the design and construction, and repair, maintenance and inspection of the region's 923 freeway and road bridges and 5 land and water tunnels.


R-6 crosses Two Moon Creek heading west

These bridges range from the mile-long (including approaches) cable-stayed F-60 bridge across the East Channel to numerous short iron truss spans over creeks and streams built in the late 1800s and early 1900s.


S-511 crosses Hay Flats Creek

The region has three mountain and two underwater road and highway tunnels.  One alternative proposed as a resolution of the Riverfront Freeway controversy is the "Little Dig," which would put a little less than a mile of the new freeway underground.  Cost estimates, though, exceed the amount of 3RRDOT's total budget over the next 10 years.

      Rail Transport Division.  This division is charged with... [future update]

      Ports and Waterways.  This division is charged with... [future update]

      Air Transport.  This division is charged with... [future update][/data][/row][/tabular]


David

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