[pierreh]

A bit of sightseeing today. We are visiting The Tip, in Trelayne:



Trelayne is largely built around an inland lake. A small peninsula in that lake has been dubbed "The Tip" by the Trelaynians. It is a favorite leisure spot, especially in the summer when people visit it to enjoy the refreshing light breeze usually blowing over the lake.

[brian51]

Its nice to see you making use of some of the water configurations with land in the maps .
I enjoy greatly doing this kinda thing also, Pierre

[pierreh]

Major highway interchange reconstruction in Arcens.

Being at the center of the Talaran cluster, Arcens has a complex network of highways linking it to all other cities. This also entails several T-type interchanges, that originally were all constructed as parclos, and were all gradually changed into better interchanges, taking into account the flows of traffic between the various branches.

At the same time, some highways were widened, often from 4 lanes to 6 lanes, to account with the growth of the inter-city traffic. Alas, this was not carried out systematically, and some situations led to bottlenecks. In particular, the highway linking Arcens to Polsay in the south was only partially converted from 4 to 6 lanes; the portion close to the center of the city remained a 4-lane highway:



Also, the interchange between the central highway and the branch to Trelayne in the west was designed at a time where the main traffic was between the western and northern branches: that traffic could run on 2 lanes in each direction, all other flows could only use single lane (MIS) roadways. In addition, the 90 degree curve south of the interchange imposed limitations on ramps, leading to a somewhat unsatisfying design:



As the various cities grew, the patterns of the inter-city traffic changed. Eventually, the main traffic flow in the interchange became the north-south flow, that could only use one lane per direction, leading to a severe congestion:



It was decided to rebuild the entire interchange, with 2 lanes available for all flows. The portion of the highway to Polsay was to be upgraded from 4 to 6 lanes. It was also desired to destroy as few buildings as possible, although that turned out to be difficult. In a first stage, the old highway branches and ramps were all bulldozed to make room for the new construction:



The new interchange was then built, featuring again ramps on 3 levels but with a modified layout. One road and one avenue undergoround crossings had to be modified. A number of buildings (commercial buildings east of the interchange, residential ones on the west of it) had to be bulldozed, since the new interchange required more space; some new lots could be zoned. At the end of the construction the situation looked like this:



Since the new interchange was inaugurated, the city continued to grow, including on the newly zoned lots. The last picture in this post shows one residential and two commercial buildings under construction near the interchange:




The highway reconstruction program will continue in Arcens with the widening of the highway to Deramey in the east, from 4 to 6 lanes.

[brian51]

So beautiful are your highway systems  and interchanges.
I could scarcely imagine anyone else's to be superior

So after you have had enough time to run the game now with the new interchange for several games year,
Are you satisfied with the reduction of traffic congestion in this area ?

[pierreh]

So after you have had enough time to run the game now with the new interchange for several games year,
Are you satisfied with the reduction of traffic congestion in this area ?

After rebuilding the interchange, I ran the city for a few months only, enough to get the traffic essentially back onto the roadways, and see the start of the construction of new buildings. Therefore at this point I can give a provisional answer, which I'll document with 2 pictures.

The traffic in the south-north direction (in the morning commute) has by and large resumed:



The values measured on the old branch of the interchange were 18'772 cars and 363 'buses'; car traffic 'after' is 92% of car traffic 'before', and bus traffic is very close, and small in any case. I have no doubt that, in a few more months of game time the car traffic will increase to reach, and possibly exceed, the old value.

Now, what does this say in terms of congestion? Here is the congestion view of the same area:



It is green all over the place, except where two roadways are stacked over the same tile. Ergo, no congestion at all. For the record, I use a customized 'Euro' version of the Ultra traffic simulator.

[brian51]

Yes this is what you seek-
Impressive traffic volume but without the congestion

[pierreh]

In post #176 of this CJ we followed the highway traffic, mostly cars, from Saveille thru Polsay, then thru Arcens, toward Deramey. I wondered about what happened in Deramey, and whether the Sims would continue on to Cherenne.

The answer to that question is very puzzling. Here is what is seen and measured on the Deramey side of the highway link with Arcens:



The number of 'buses' (339) is reasonably close to that measured in Arcens (363) and we don't worry about trucks.

But where are the cars? According to the measurement in Arcens, 18'651 cars were going to Deramey. On the Deramey side there is not a single car arriving from Arcens!

And this is not a matter of not running Deramey long enough to 'acquire' the figures from Arcens. Both cities have been - like all others - developped with as much synchronicity as the game allows. Other links, as shown earlier, preserve the respective counts of cars and buses within a few percentage points. In this case, the numbers have never matched.

There is something very fishy at work here. The situation will continue to be monitored.

[brian51]

Pierre,

yes I am quite concerned for you about that many vanishing cars !
Please keep us posted on this issue...

[pierreh]

This will be the final post about the highways, disappearing cars and Sims looking for work in other cities, until further notice.

We saw the cars disappearing between Arcens and Deramey in the morning commute. And what about the evening commute then?

I first looked at the situation in Deramey:



There are more Sims returning to Arcens by bus, than came into Deramey in the morning. However, the traffic queries were not taken at the same time, the evening commute query was taken some game months later in Deramey. Then, there are a few cars and the usual trucks that, as we know, vanish at the city border.

Now on the Arcens side:



The numbers for the cars and the 'buses' match those of the Deramey side, within the error margins. But why is the volume color solid red?

There is something quite fishy in that area. My hunch is that the traffic simulator is misbehaving. Or it could be that, for some odd reason, some data wasn't saved properly when exiting the city, and this cannot be recovered. Or something else entirely. I shan't worry more about this, there are plenty of other things to attend to, as I continue to develop the cities.

[pierreh]

The next milestone has been reached:



The region, encompassing the Talaran and the Sambey clusters, has a total population is 18 Mio Sims. The next milestone for the region is to reach 19 Mio Sims, this looks achievable. In terms of cities, I may be able to show the first city reaching 1.6 Mio Sims soon.

[brian51]

Pierre,

congrats !

i I check my current region population and it is about 18.169 K
So that is what you need to surpass to become the new community Population King !!

[brian51]

This than is my reply to Pierre's previous post about the :

This will be the final post about the highways, disappearing cars and Sims looking for work in other cities,

What i think is happening is that the red is indicating  a lot of traffic thru the city Borders, and this is why the congestion graph
is showing red. This would be fairly common as typically we see a lot of traffic with inter -city situations ..

My guess is that the traffic reporting is inaccurate even though the actual traffic is very heavy.
I think this would be consistent with what I have observed with game bugs with the city's borders/ connections.

But just my "take" on this interesting traffic situation ..

[pierreh]

Salveille is the first city in the Talaran cluster to reach a population of 1.6 Mio Sims:



Two other cities are getting very close. Actually, in the Talaran cluster, most cities continue to grow properly, with one exception: Marlande has become a problem city, with an alternance of abandonment of residential buildings, and rebuilding of some residences, without a discernable reason.

[pierreh]

This is my last post in this City Journal.

First and for the record, the total population of the region is now higher than 19 Mio Sims :

All cities have continued to grow. One city (Marlande) has shown episodes of regression with some abandonment of residences. I traced it to saturated means of transportation, and applied remedial measures, after which the city resumed a slow rythm of growth.

Reaching 20 Mio Sims in the region would not be difficult, given that a good half of the 15 cities involved have room for further zonal expansion. However this is no longer a goal of mine.

I set out to exercise regional playing, fully aware of the limitations of that form of playing because of its insufficiently developed functionality. The shortcomings of regional playing have become constantly more evident with the increase in population of the various cities. In particular, inaccurate and/or improper handling of inter-city flows by the traffic simulator, reported in earlier posts, has been a source of problems.

The large, probably abnormal, amount of inter-city traffic has obliged me to resort to extreme measures, including implementing way too many subway links. Also, enormous traffic on some ‘corridors’ in cities also meant applying unrealistic measures to contain it. It has worked until now, but containing that traffic has ceased to be interesting. (It has also come to my attention that using subways in the game is considered by some people to be a form of cheating ; I think that this opinion is a load of horse manure, nevertheless it does play a part in my decision to stop).

Therefore the two clusters in the region will not be further developed. I may play one of the cities occasionally, but the exercise as a whole is terminated. My next project will be a self-contained city, without any regional connections, in which I’ll try out some techniques that I did not use in the two existing clusters. That new city will be in the same region because it still has a number of interesting city tiles. There will be no city journal for that new project.

Thanks to those who followed this city journal, and farewell.

[brian51]

Thanks Pierre,

for all the wonderful postings you have provided us in your CJ, over the years..

Also good luck in this self contained city,

which is the main style of play I have used for many years now..


You have provided us with  both,.. many informative postings + what I would also call instructive postings..
I express a great deal of gratitude for all the hard work and perseverance you have put into these postings.

Thanks, Brian

[Guardian]

Thanks for keeping us updated on this CJ pierre! Hate to see this one end, but totally understand it.

I look forward to any future updates!