Re: Santa Barbara County - Update: The End.

[planetechef]

First post here for me, never too late  great job on your traffic and congratulation of course of the OSITM, well deserve 

[threestooges]

Now that's a fine advertisment for the new NAM. The TLAs look great in that application, very true to life around those parts (and also around here). Picture 8 of yours gave me an idea for a scene involving the GLR. I'll have to see how well it comes together, but it hearkens back to the days of the Pacific Electric to the south in early Los Angeles, and the orange fields of what is now referred to as the Inland Empire. I'm curious how you've been choosing to develop the area, if there's a particular vision you have in mind, of if you've just been building what seems to suit the area for the time. Either way, it's looking great.
-Matt

[Tomas Neto]

Hi my friend, congrats on the OSITM!!!

Nice suburbs and rural area too!!!

[RickD]

Charles Francis Harper Expressway - Part 2

Good news, the State of California has granted a budget to finally extend CFH Expressway!

9.1

This is the right of way for the new stretch of highway. An intersection with Las Palmas Drive will be built. This will be a big relief for traffic on Hollister Avenue. I have shown you how bad the situation there was in Update Nr. 4 .


9.2

Construction will start right here where the existing part of CFH ends at the intersection with Las Positas Road. Some houses and streets have been built in the Right Of Way here. They will have to be demolished. It seems someone didn't pay attention here but of course no one wants to be responsible. 


9.3

Caltrans started as soon as possible and didn't hesitate to tear down anything in the way. But don't worry, the people have been paid good compensations.


9.4

Here will be the Overpass over Las Palmas Drive.


9.5

Construction of the overpass.


9.6

An overview of the new alignment under construction.


9.7

Construction of the onramp. It will be connected to Las Palmas Rd with a roundabout.


9.8

The first stretch is finished. A new fancy intersection with Las Positas Road has been built. The only small flaw is one missing slip lane. The old man living in the little house refused to sell his land. Not even a very generous compensation could change his mind. But lets see how long his stubborness lasts with rising traffic levels.
The only task left here is to reconnect Hill Street.


9.9.

It was simply rerouted through the village. There was no need for a fancy and expensive new alignment because traffic levels on Hill Street will drop significantly with the completion of the new Expressway.


9.10

The overpass and onramp are finished, too.


9.11

And here is the overview of the new road in this tile.


9.12



9.13



9.14



9.15

Some more impressions of the new expressway.


9.16

Construction continues in the next tile through the suburbs of Goleta.


9.17

Wow, that was fast. It is already finished. (Don't want to bore you with too many generic construction pics.=


9.18

This undeveloped land is designated for commercial development. Jobs are badly needed in this part of the city. But we will leave this for a future update.


Thats it. Looking forward to your comments. And please keep in mind that this is not a recreation of the actual Santa Barbara.



Replies:

ManuelR & Nardo69:
Oh, the sidewalks. One of the most annoying things in SC4 to date. I love the asphalt sidewalks in the city center. But they sure look odd in rural areas. I will try to use it more selectively by removing it temporarily from my plugin folder when taking pics in certain areas. I hate it that I don't have detailed manual control over the appearance of sidewalks. They have a mind of their own and seem to never do what I want. 

Haljackey:
Thanks, Hal! I'm especially glad that you like it.

marsh:
Hey marsh, nice to see you here.

ecoba:
Thanks, Ethan.

Nexis4Jersey:
Thanks. Yeah, I am so excited about the new NAM.

io_bg:
Hope the second part was no disappointment.

nbvc:
Thanks!

TmiguelT:
Good to know that some people are actually reading my humble tries at establishing a background story. Well, I am certainly not a writer but at least I try to give reasons why things are how they are in my Santa Barbara.

canyonjumper:
Thanks, Jordan. In my opinion this is the best NAM release ever.

planetechef:
Welcome and thank you!

threestooges:

I'm curious how you've been choosing to develop the area, if there's a particular vision you have in mind, of if you've just been building what seems to suit the area for the time.

A bit of both, I guess. I do have a vision for the whole region in mind. But that can change when I get new ideas when building. Sometimes I even bulldoze large areas to completely rebuild them. And I follow the top-down approach. I build things rough and not very detailed first, then I revisit the area several times to make changes and work on the details.
You will probably learn more about my building style when I am finished with the first "season" of updates. When I run out of stuff I have already build I will have to change my style to showing how I develop empty tiles.

Tomas Neto:
Thanks Tomas!

[marsh]

Thats a great idea for the interchanges. Thats how alot here are. There isnt much traffic so major interchanges are not needed. You made them quite nice too.   

,marsh 

[ecoba]

Wow, my friend. Beautiful update. The expressway really is a nice touch, and the way that you have shown us the construction and expansion of it is really interesting and just there are just gorgeous pictures.

Ethan

[io_bg]

I just love the way you've used the RHW. So inspiring makes me fire up SC4 again (although I haven't finished my homework )

[canyonjumper]

Wow Rick! I wasn't sure where RHW ended and Avenue began! Nice blending! I also like the intersections; we have those here in BC too, where a full-fledged interchange isn't needed yet. Great work!

                        -Jordan

[Nanami]

Great MD!

[ManuelR]

Hey RickD, great update again! I love the way you put everything together so realistic and still leave a lot of open space. It's always my problem to build everything together to close, and then I have no open areas left.
In 9.17 You have some big condos with 4 residental buildings on it (between avenue and highway). Where did you get these, they look awsome.
Also I wanted to ask you what terrain mod and tree control you are using, just out of curiosity. I was playing the Santa Barbara map before with the Italia Terrain Mod and Italia Tree Controler, but it somehow looked different, with a lot of stupid red bushes and yellow flowers...

[turtle]

Wow, great work! I love how you've taken the new NAM into play, it looks amazing.
Congrats on the OSITM - it's well worth it

[Tarkus]

Raphael, what a great update here--I really like what you've done with all the new NAM stuff.  I knew you'd make excellent use of it!   I really like the planning and construction bits you worked into the project as well.  Being a "roadgeek" myself, I always really enjoy seeing that, and it seems like you've chosen a good alignment for the CFH Expressway.

And I got a kick out of the "Two and a Half Men" reference, too.

-Alex

[Nexis4Jersey]

Very nice , i like the detailed added into this really impressive

[art128]

Nice update there ! I like the new look of that highway.
Your works seems to be well done. The RHW fits in very well and the farms you used are just perfect here.

Take care,
-Arthur.

[Battlecat]

Great job on this update!  I quite enjoyed seeing that new highway come together. 

[Nardo69]

Nice roadgeekery. Even though as a middle European infrastructure engineer I would prefer exits for such a street that do not require to turn left ...

Nice touch with the railway line - I love how it limits the residential aria! It's just a pity that there are no FA cables for the high voltage lines ...

Take care my friend!

Bernhard 

[daryl7478]

Nice job!!! I like it that you used the great state of California for this! This is my home state. Anyways, I-5 is actually US-101 in real. Just hope to see Goleta. Once when we were going to LA, we stopped at a gas station in Goleta. Also what's next? Malibu? Ventura? Even LA?
Good Luck!
daryl7478

[RickD]

Hi all,

I planned on getting out another update during my OSITM but RL prevented it. My moving from Kaiserslautern to Mainz proved to be more elaborate than I estimated (can't believe how much stuff I collected in the past few years), taking up most of my free time. And then my neighbour in the old apartment started a fire and almost burnt down the house (before I moved out my stuff) and when I arrived in the new apartment I found the kitchen to be under water. The hose of the dish washer leaked. The whole floor had to be torn out. We are living on a construction site at the moment. It will take another week until everything is dry and the new floor can be installed. The worst thing is that probably I will have to pay for it.
The good thing of course is that I am finally living together with my girlfriend again. She had to move out 1.5 years ago when she got a job in Frankfurt. Now we met again in the middle between my workplace and her workplace.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed my updates and you will keep on following my humble MD in the Recently Published (and hopefully soon in the Best Sellers) section. If you do not like roadgeekery please hang on and rest assured that there also will be non-roadgeek updates in the future.

Thank you for all the kind comments, a new update will be ready soon!



Replies:

marsh:
Thank you, Marsh!

ecoba:
Thanks, my friend.

io_bg:
I could see in your MD that you are using the new NAM very well, too.

canyonjumper:
Thanks, Jordan! Maybe I will need to build some interchanges in the future.

976:
Thank you, glad you like it.

ManuelR:
Thanks! I have to force myself to keep clear areas. It is always so tempting to build more and more zones.
I did not have time to search for a download link but the query tool says the buildings are called "CAL_Mariners_QuayBlock". I hope this helps you finding them.
My terraind Mod is Missouri Breaks, the Tree controller is Cycledoggs Meadowshire River Tree Controller. But in some places I place selected trees by hand. The ones in the National Park Update for example are all hand plopped. I could provide download links quite easily, let me know if you don't find those mods.

turtle:
Glad you like it!

Tarkus:
Thanks for the compliment.

And I got a kick out of the "Two and a Half Men" reference, too.

I love that show and I was watching it when building the road.

Nexis4Jersey:
Thanks. BTW, your Youtube Channel is pretty cool. Next time I am in NYC I will visit Jersey City, too.

art128:
Thank you, Arthur.

Battlecat:
Thanks!

Nardo69:
Thanks Bernhard. I tried to recreate those Expressway type of road I have seen on Youtube roadgeek videos. They are multi-lane roads but with traffic lights. They are not common in Germany, I think. Maybe I will have to upgrade the road to freeway standards when traffic levels rise.
I would love to see the rail line electrified, too and I love Royal's catenary set. But there are some important parts missing that prevent me from using it.

daryl7478:
Welcome to my MD! You are right, there is no I-5 through real Santa Barbara. But my version of it is fictional and set in an alternate universe USA.

[ecoba]

Sorry to hear about your RL troubles, my friend. Hope that everything will be sorted out soon, and hopefully you won't have to pay for the floors.

Ethan

[Tomas Neto]

Hi my friend, many troubles...  I expect that everything improves quickly!!! 

Fantastic update again!!!