[comp.sys.mac.games] SimCity Realism

wbm@freedom.stanford.edu (Wally Mann) (01/21/91)

I've been playing SimCity for only a little while, but
it seems that traffic doesn't act intuitively.

I played the Bern scenario.  Traffic congestion is the
problem and you have ten years to reduce it.  I spent
my ten years bulldozing roads.  Not replacing ... just
bulldozing.  Anywere the traffic was high, I blasted the
road without regard to whether it left some zone stranded.
Traffic got lighter and lighter ... AND NOBODY LEFT THE
CITY!  My popularity stayed high and I eventually earned
the keys to the city.

At other times I've tried to reduce traffic by building
multilane freeways (roads side by side).  This doesn't
seem to work.  You can widen roads until the cows come
home and it seems like traffic comes out of nowhere ...
like roads create traffic.

Just commenting.
Wally

gil@daffy.gatech.edu (Gil Neiger) (01/22/91)

In article <1991Jan20.201345.27412@Neon.Stanford.EDU> wbm@freedom.stanford.edu
(Wally Mann) writes:
>
>At other times I've tried to reduce traffic by building
>multilane freeways (roads side by side).  This doesn't
>seem to work.  You can widen roads until the cows come
>home and it seems like traffic comes out of nowhere ...
>like roads create traffic.

I haven't played SimCity, but in real life I can attest that (in
Atlanta at least) building roads does create traffic.  No matter
how big they get, they're always full.  The existence of a road
concentrates population in areas that can take advantage of the
road.

					- Gil Neiger
					gil@cc.gatech.edu

morris@hpcc01.HP.COM (Dale Morris) (01/23/91)

/ hpcc01:comp.sys.mac.games / wbm@freedom.stanford.edu (Wally Mann) / 12:13 pm  Jan 20, 1991 /

Wally,

> I played the Bern scenario.  Traffic congestion is the
> problem and you have ten years to reduce it.  I spent
> my ten years bulldozing roads.  Not replacing ... just
> bulldozing.  Anywere the traffic was high, I blasted the
> road without regard to whether it left some zone stranded.
> Traffic got lighter and lighter ... AND NOBODY LEFT THE
> CITY!

Perhaps you removed so many roads that the people *couldn't* leave the city!

Just an idea

- Dale

billlund@hpindwa.cup.hp.com (Bill Lund) (01/23/91)

Without knowing the details of how they actually route traffic, it seems
that there is some degree of "randomness" in how the routes are established.
Further since anytime you put a road next to a road, you need up with an
intersection instead of a "limited access freeway" you end up with a lot
of possibilities.  

One thing I tried, which seemed to work was to "cover" a road with 
power wires and then place another road next to it.  What you end
up with is two roads going from one place to another without the
continuous intersections and cross traffic.  It actually seemed
to work.

In my opinion, this is one of the things that Maxis needs to fix in
the next release (will there be one?) of Simcity.  They were asking
in America Online for ideas and "limited access freeways" was one
thing I suggested.

Bill Lund
HP-Cupertino