Tips on getting larger cities?

[sm0kie]

Hey all, newbie Mayor here =)

I started playing Rush Hour for a week, and for once in my Simcity career (Simcity 2000-3000) I actually managed to earn profit and stay afloat without cheating!

Anyway, here's my Q.  How do I increase my population once every single square has been zoned or built on?  I have used the overlay to check if every single zone is dense.

Let me give you guys some more background on my game:

I have 3 cities so far, all on the largest square size, on easy mode.

My first city (40,000 pop.) I semi-followed a guide.  It's entire coast is lined with beaches, all residential areas are covered with school, police, fire, medical.  There's a good mix of high medium and low wealth residents.  I built an international airport in this city, but I didn't feel any increase in commerce demand.  Right now, this city is teetering on razor thin tax profit.  (maybe only 200 simoleans or so)

My second city (30,000 pop) is just a huge farmland.  Farms throughout, with some residential and commerial spread.  It's connected to my first city with roads.

My third city (my favourite  50,000 population) is connected to my first city with an avenue.  It's got all high tech industry, mostly high wealth residents, and also has an international airport.  My problem is, everything seems to be really good, crime/traffic/health/etc ratings are either very high or perfect, except my environment, which is at half.  I have been running this city on cheetah speed for quite some time, and the population just goes up and down from 50,000.  Everything is now zoned for dense, and I even built a landmark in the center of my commercial area.  One thing I do notice is sometimes a suitcase icon appears (No Job).

Should I make a neighbor city with more med-low wealth jobs?  Should I think about constructing a highway??  I would have to demolish so much precious zoning =(

I am sorry for this huge wall of text, but I am just stuck!

[sm0kie]

One more quick Question, I just downloaded NAM, and havent got to try it out yet.

During installation, in the options area, I wasn't sure which one to choose.  I went with "smarter pathfinding".

The ones with 10x stuff is cheating right?  I hope the one I chose isn't cheating.

[capo]

Anyway, here's my Q.  How do I increase my population once every single square has been zoned or built on?  I have used the overlay to check if every single zone is dense.

.....

One thing I do notice is sometimes a suitcase icon appears (No Job).

I think that's the answer right there: a lack of jobs. When you have a residential area with excellent education, health, enviroment and police/fire protection. The wealth of those sims will go up, the highest wealth sims only want to work in big commercial buildings or the non-poluting industry and not in small commercials,farms or polluting industry.

Should I make a neighbor city with more med-low wealth jobs?  Should I think about constructing a highway??  I would have to demolish so much precious zoning =(

If your city is located at water, I'd suggest creating a nice harbour with plenty of High Wealth Industrial zones. Don't forget to also zone some residential areas (without too much education) for some good harbor and early industry labourers. Once those ind. zones really start to develop, they will employ much more people then the small res. zone you created. Also create more roads/railroads/Avenues/Highways to neighbouring cities. The better the transportation between cities: the better the trade is going to be

and try to build commercial zones next to these roads/avenues to other cities..it's a great place to develop commercial buildings!

I am sorry for this huge wall of text, but I am just stuck!

Don't worry we all had to learn sometime!

One more quick Question, I just downloaded NAM, and havent got to try it out yet.

During installation, in the options area, I wasn't sure which one to choose.  I went with "smarter pathfinding".

The ones with 10x stuff is cheating right?  I hope the one I chose isn't cheating.

The NAM is quite delicate and it's important what options you chose to install it. First rule is: always read the read me file! I have never had to ask a question about downloadable content yet, that's because many authors include excellent read me's...including the NAM. The NAM I would NOT call cheating, the original game capacity of roads/streets/MT/etc. are not realistic at all, the NAM makes the game more realistic. My suggestion would be to remove the NAM and reinstall it like this: *ANT selected / Reduced One Way road arrows/ All roundabouts / Avenue turning lanes / Radical 24 hr automata/ Radical custom Special. Please dont forget what files you installed, you might need it if you decide to install Road top mass transit.

I really hope this helps, I must admit that I always play the game in Dutch so I hope I got the English Sim City lingo right

Good luck with your city!

ps: be sure to also download the NAM essentials and the excellent custom content for NAM at the LEX (like the SAM, Rural Highways and some of the best bridges you've ever seen.

[xxdita]

I totally recommend installing the CAM to get those bigger cities. They'll grow like you won't believe.
And it doesn't hurt to build up a couple of the smaller neighboring cities, as a suburb, or industrial area. I find that my cities get stagnant without enough neighbor development. Sometimes the demand for industry is so high that I have to build an entire small city of nothing but industry.
I never use highways. Just avenues, but plenty of them. And mass transit, especially buses and subways.