Perfect city? 13 things a city MUST have to be "perfect"

[ExiLe]

This is a direct translation of an article written by a Norwegian scientific magazine called Illustrert vitenskap, or in English "Scientific Illustrated"

So basically I read an article a few days ago about cities, and how some cities suffer because they are poorly planned or too well planned (like f.ex Brasilia). Also in this article I found kind of a recipe on "what a city has to have in order to be a perfect city". The recipe goes through 13 points, so I thought it could be interesting to see if these could be use in Sim City 4. I'll just list them up as they were, and then translate the points (which of course are about RL cities) into information that can be used in Sim City 4 RH.

1.There has to be a legible town/city central

In SC4: Well more or less this doesn't just mean that you need a clear transition between your residential or industrial area and your downtown, but it also means that you should have a clear transition between your res/ind. area and your local commercial districts. This is explained later on...

2.You should be able to walk to your closest (local) commercial district in maximum 5 minutes.

In SC4: Quite straight forward; each Sim should not live further away from a local or city centre than (5 min is 1/12 hour, average walking speed is 4.8km/h, so about 400m, 1 tile is 16m in all directions so...) 25 tiles. More will be explained in point 4.

3.There should be a good mixture of all building styles in a city to attract all types of citizens, f.ex. Families, Students, older generations and so on.

In SC4: Well this means that you'll need areas where families would thrive (little traffic, green areas to play on, safe and quiet environment), where your grand-daddy would want to live(close to a bar, close to a duck pond ), and so on...
This actually works quite well in game, and I have used this method my self for years now. Your Sims will actually be attracted to different areas, not only because of different occupations and work conditions, but also to smaller things like if it lies in a more rural area, or in a suburban area. Different areas attract different people, this can be regulated in game quite easily by attracting different social classes to areas where they are needed.
Some examples;
-Area dedicated for workers at the closest industrial area. Mostly R$, and blocks, but also some R$$.
-Suburban areas (small ones) with R$$ residents. Mostly you shouldn't plan too many suburban areas. These will often, as the city grows, turn into huge suburban areas which is not good for your  Sims.
-An area dedicated to parks, greenery and R$$$ housing, not too far away from your city core. These areas are an attractive are for embassies. Here is the place where you also want to put you   museums, and grand libraries.

4.Local shops

In SC4: So as stated in point 1 and 2, Sims should have a short distance to a local food store, bank (ATM) and such. The reason for this is that Sims should have the possibility to walk or ride their bicycle to a commercial area instead of having to drive there. This doesn't only help the environment, but it also improves health, traffic and other normal problems in bigger cities today. The dumb thing is that Sims in SC4 don't really want to walk more than 6 tiles (almost 100m). So you should have a bus stop within 6 tiles and then another bus stop in the closest commercial area.

5.Behind certain buildings there should be room to build office space or workshops, this means building small alleys or openings between buildings that can turn into dark areas where criminals can hide and rats will thrive should be avoided. In Europe certain areas that were dark alleys are turned into walkways with glass roofing and small parks behind and between buildings, which is also a possibility.

In SC4: This gets a bit tricky to use in the game since nothing will really grow if it isn't connected directly with a road. Though if you have open space between your buildings, you could place a park there or perhaps some trees.

6.Schools should be placed within walking distances.

In SC4: Well since in real life, SC4 walking distance of 5 min is around 25 tiles, schools should be maximum 50 tiles or perhaps 75 tiles away from a Sim. The in game schools will not cover such big areas, but there are modifications which make school covering distances more realistic, just check out different modifications found on many of the Sim City fan sites.

7.NOT more than 150m to the closest playground.

In SC4: So if 1 tile is 16m, then 150m is 9 tiles (actually 9,3 but whatever). It is really important that your Sim-kids can walk to a playground with a friend and play there, instead of sitting at home in front of the PlayStation all day. This also helps to reduce crime and improve health.

8.Exciting/Interesting transportation network, with more than one option to get from A to B.

In SC4: OK, so creating an exciting transportation network is really that important? Well yes, there are several reasons why a transportation network should not only have different options to get from A to B, but also f.ex. have a mixture of roundabouts, light regulated intersections and so on. Of course the main reason for this is to prevent the Sims from only using one road, or rail line, to get to where they want. This also calls for diagonal roads, crossing subways, monorails and much more that you can do in SC4, so sorry to all you Grid Lovers, but a Grid is not an exciting transportation network.

9.Moderately narrow streets or pathways, with room for pedestrians and bicycles.

In SC4: This is something you see in most or many of the larger cities today. Sims will sometimes walk to their destination (within 6 Tiles), but other than that the game doesn't have a built in possibility to let Sims use their bikes or walk on walk-paths. This is actually a vital part of a city, and personally this has bugged me since day one. It would help your Sims to work off some calories, and ease the car generated traffic a bit. There is user generated material on the different Sim City Fan sites that work as walkways, but I would love to see it as an actual in game transport function with diagonals etc.

10.The houses in your city downtown should have their facades out towards the street, to create a "city room".

In SC4: Normally buildings in game will have their facades out towards the streets as default, so this isn't normally a problem in SC4. This is a very important point, so that you won't have lots of those empty streets causing abandonment, which will eventually attract crime.

11.Parking lots, and parking garages, should be hidden behind buildings and away from the streets.

In SC4: Well there aren't any actual parking spots in SC4 since all the Sims drive right into their offices (which would be cool in real life). Though you do have the possibility to build parking garages, but these are mostly used as an expansion to a nearby station that is part of your transportation network. Anyhow it is possible to place a parking garage behind a building, just make sure you connect it with a road.

12.   Public institutions or departments should have a street address which is easy to remember.

In SC4: Since SC4 doesn't care about street addresses you might think that this doesn't apply to the game. It is an idea though to put buildings like a police station or a school at the start of a street, or at an intersection. You want your Sims to be able to reach your public institution as fast as possible. If you tend to hide away your important public institutions, less Sims will actually have any use of them, thus making the institutions obsolete. Also in smaller interchanges, around your rural areas it can also be an idea to build parks and libraries at the end of each corner. Mostly Sims don't like to live near traffic jams and noise, so building attractive parks in such areas can solve some problems. 

13.The city, or city districts (boroughs), should have a certain form of self-government.

In SC4: Well in game you don't really have to deal with neighbourhood governing or other self-governing townships.  But it is still a good idea to let all your neighbourhoods have a certain central space where all members of that area can meet. This probably won't affect the in game experience, but it is something to add some realism into the game. A police station for each borough might be a solution.

Some other quotations from the same article:

"Self reliable cities; UN posts that 15% of everything cultivated on the planet comes from the large cities."

William McDonough says, "The cities of the future are green and alive. They will grow and breathe like plants and trees".

So now that you all have the "Scientific recipe" on how to build a perfect city, maybe you should open SC4RH and construct the future city today! 

I hope you all thought this was worth reading, and also I know people might want to add extra information or their own ideas (as in nr.5 where I couldn't really come up with a lot of in game solutions). Do so as you wish, but as I stated above this is a translation of an article written in a Norwegian scientific magazine, except for the "In SC4" part of course which contains my own opinion on in game use and strategy.



Credits:
Illustrert Vitenskap for the article
DOXXP29 for taking a look at my spelling, thanks man. 

[jeronij]

That is what I call an interesting, useful and worth reading tutorial 
I am sure the ideas exposed here will we expanded and improved by our members 

All: Some example pics to illustrate how you apply these points to make your cities more realistic would be welcome as well 

[Rayden]

Very nice article. Some of the things in here are new to me, some others, like civic or institutional services, I always place them them on main arteries or cross roads. I have not much experience with big cities yet, but my small villages or suburban areas are composed my a main road, crossed by several streets and I always leave at least, one tile empty on those intersections and along the road to place small retail shops and other commercial services. At the end of the streets, I place, car parks, green parks or playgrounds.

I've made this on Excel that shows more or less how I usually build my small neighbourhoods.


I've used the same colours of the game, to make things easier to follow.

[Diggis]

This is a great list.  Interesting to see how I try to follow these ideas, although it doens't usually work out quite right.

[ExiLe]

diggis: Thanks for your feedback! What you are saying is true though, some of those points will not have a significant impact on the game. Still, they are valid points on how to make a city better for your citizens, if you like to be a good mayor

Rayden: nice Layout. It is a good add-on to the list, but obviously if you use the list (all 13 points) as reference you shouldn't build all your areas like that. As a small area part of a bigger city, it is a good layout though.

Jeronij: Thank you, and yes I also found the article quite interesting. I might go back to it later and add some more info since the article it self was about 4 pages. Also what I would find interesting is if anyone tried to follow these 13 rules (and only these rules) in SC4 and see what the outcome would be.

- Also, I found the 13 points quite interesting in the way that they give you quite a lot of room to experiment and would work well as a guide to a better city!

take care,

[Rayden]

Obviously not I build my towns in small parts, and preferably around a main artery not too long, or sometimes two main arteries crossing each other ( + ) and being the cross the centre of the town where most of the services are and some civic buildings. Residential area to the edges.

[wouanagaine]

Very nice and infromative post
This may help me building bigger towns.
However I found that the rule 7 will be hard to follow, as putting a playground will raise the desirability, and may put the R$ off.

[Diggis]

Doesn't the type of park you put in effect the type of people that want to live there?  IE the basketball court is more desirable to R$ than a garden

[ExiLe]

diggis: good question. Also, more parks will give you a higher mayor rating (MR) which also gives you a higher demand for R$$ and R$$$. There is a lot of influences, but I mostly seem to be able to attract more than enough R$ to my cities and still have a high MR and desirability. That may have something to do with some mods though 

wouanagaine: Thanks, I know that Real World contra SC4 have some unsolved issues , but depending on demand and f.ex agriculture, R$ will mostly be demanded to some degree.

take care,

[LeonardoDV]

The principles are well know as part of an urban planning movement called 'new-urbanism' that's been around for 20 or 30 years now... They're quite controversial though - they really go against the traditional planning methodologies seen in the US (although they are much more similar to what you find in Europe). Unfortunately for budding 'new-urbanists', SimCity has been largely built around traditional US practices, so it's very difficult to achieve the kind of tight integration between various commerces and residences that a truly new-urbanist city promises.

If you're interested in some real life examples of new-urbanist towns, ones built to these principles, the two most famous examples are Seahavan (the town they filmed 'The Truman Show' in) and Celebration (the town built by Disney), both in Florida... Take a close look at those two towns and see if you still agree that what they aim for is 'perfect'... Maybe, but it's certainly not a result to everyone's tastes!

[TheTeaCat]

A fascinating article. Thank you for sharing it with us.

It is also very true in my case.

X= my flat ( above parade of shops)
1= Primary school
2= Petrol/gas station and 24hr shop with ATM
3= Large park with 3 soccer pitches , enclosed playground with sprung flooring around equipment for minimising injuries
4= PUB ( not that i go there much  )
bus stop beside petrol station with town center 30 mins walk / 15mins bus to north of pic
                                               town center 30 mins walk / 15mins bus to south of pic with rail connection to                               
                                               central London

Nice canal walk to both town centers too so most of the points are well covered in my case.

It is always nice though to see how different concepts are implemented.

Derry