What's the optimal placement for water pumps?

Question

In what was undoubtedly an act of poor judgement, I recently elected reinstalled Sim City 4. Now that my addiction is in full force, I'm wondering if there's an optimal placement for water pumps in my city. Will they lower property value if I place them near residential areas? Will water pollution be worse if I place them in industrial zones or will water pollution always be a problem near industrial areas, just like air pollution? Just where should I be placing those blasted pumps?

Asked by RESPAWN

Answer

As I remember it, water pump placement does affect certain aspects including but possibly not limited to:

• If placed within the pollution area of industrial zones, the water is polluted.
• If placed near landfills water is polluted.
• If placed near 'Dirty' (Coal for example) Power Plants, water is polluted.
• If placed near residential zones, property value is lowered.
• If placed near water, output is increased. (I remember this being the case more clearly in Simcity 2000, I'm less certain about it's inclusion within SC4)

Generally following these guidelines they are best placed somewhere near a natural water source some distance from the main body of your city. This is less of an issue than water towers because the distance the pumps effect is mitigated by piping. (Just remember to provide them with power.)

As stated in my comment, take this answer with a grain of salt. I've written it entirely based off my memory and cannot prove or source any of the information.

Answered by Ender

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Does my city really need polluting industries?

Question

I've noticed that scaring off dirty industry with high taxes does not appear to have any negative impact on my city's growth or economy. Ideally, I would only have high-tech in my city, so that I may safely mix industry with residential to reduce commute times, but when I proceed to raise manufacturing taxes, however, the game warns me that this spells doom for my city.

Is this true? Is there some reason manufacturing jobs are essential to my city, and if so, is there some way to make sure manufacturing buildings don't mix with high-tech buildings?

Asked by oKtosiTe

Answer

No, not really. The main issue you need to look at here is whether your city has sufficient demand for high tech industries to replace the tax revenue from polluting industries. Hi-tech demand is strongly predicated on education, so make sure the education level and the RCI indices for Hi-tech are high. If you really want to make sure the Sims who can't work in Hi-tech jobs still have jobs, start a new small neighbouring city and fill it with heavy industry tiles. One of the magic of SimCity is that each city is wrapped in an air tight bubble that doesn't allow pollution to waft over from city to city.

To actually get rid of polluting industries and transition to Hi-tech, you can either demolish them all at once, or slowly get rid of them section by section. Hi-tech industries cannot live in the same area as polluting industries, including polluting power plants. This is because Hi-tech industries have calculate desirability in a manner similar to residential areas, and are thus extremely sensitive to pollution. If you're not averse to installing mods, the Air Purification Plant can make your life much easier.

To get rid of polluting industries, slowly jack taxes up to 13% to slow down and stop growth, then to 18-20% when you're ready to get rid of them entirely. Raise taxes for $I first, then $$I, to keep the disruption on tax revenue to a minimum. You can also grow new Hi-tech zones by zoning medium density industries around residential areas and filling them with trees to minimize pollution. There is no way you can actually stop dirty and manufacturing industries from appearing in these zones - you just have to make sure your tax rates are sufficiently high and the desirability and demand for Hi-tech are higher than that for dirty industries. You can manually prune these areas of polluting factories, but that's not a policy that is sustainable in the long run.

Answered by Yi Jiang

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What's the exact population limit at which demand for agriculture disappears?

Question

In SimCity 4, I'm trying to set up a large city with lots of farmland. I've read on several sites (and experienced first-hand) that at a certain growth level demand for agriculture drops entirely, but I can't find any exact information.

Does anyone know how large I can make my city before no new farms will be built?

Asked by oKtosiTe

Answer

A city has a maximum number of residents or jobs that it can support for each type of zone (broken down by wealth level). For example, a new city can support 20,000 R§ sims, 2,000 R§§, 1,000 R§§§, 3,000 CO§§ jobs, and so on. These are referred to as "demand caps". Once the demand cap is reached for a given category, no more buildings of that type will be built. Certain buildings provide demand cap relief, increasing the demand cap by a certain amount for one or more categories (e.g. a City Zoo provides 8,000 R§ and 16,000 R§§ demand cap relief, increasing the maximum population your city can support).

There are only a few buildings that provide Industrial demand cap relief, and none that provide IA (agricultural) relief. However, Industrial relief is provided by freight connections. Several times a month, industrial buildings sent out freight shipments, and each one that successfully reaches either a neighbor connection or a seaport provides 20 demand cap relief for each industrial type.

Agricultural demand cap is a special case. For every other demand type, the demand cap is simply compared to sims or jobs of that type. The agricultural demand cap, however, is reduced by all other jobs. The starting agricultural demand cap is 30,000, so if you have a city with, say, 2,000 CO jobs and 3,000 ID jobs, that would only allow 25,000 IA jobs, and as the rest of your city grows the limit would keep decreasing. Once the total number of jobs in your city (both agricultural and otherwise) reaches the IA demand cap, no new farms will be built. There's no way in-game to see what the current demand caps are, but the starting value should give you an idea.

(Source of this information is the Prima strategy guide; I can't guarantee that these numbers are still accurate, but they should be close.)

Answered by mkarasek

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Differences between SimCity 4 and CitiesXL

Question

Can you tell me the main differences between those two games? Which one is more suitable for a less casual gaming experience?

Asked by happy_emi

Answer

Cities XL's big feature was the online multiplayer, but that has been shut down now. Cities XL's gameplay allows you to build cities that are more varied in appearence than those in Simcity 4, with features such as curved roads and different types of zones (linear - think inner city with houses on edge, freeform, curved (good for suburbs), compared to Simcity 4's grid. Some of these can be replicated manually in Simcity, like the linear zones, while others like the curved and freeform zones can't be.

However, Simcity 4 is the more in depth of the two in most aspects with features such as garbage disposal and pre-game terraforming, but there are a few cases where Cities XL has more detail (specific bus routes as opposed to just plopping stations everywhere).

For the less casual gameplay then, I'd go with Simcity 4, but Cities XL isn't entirely lacking in depth either.

Answered by Macha

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How do I build large, healthy cities in Simcity 4?

Question

Every time I play Simcity 4, my cities usually end up broke and overpolluted by the time they reach 100k citizens. What's the best way to try and get a happy, healthy, and profitable large city?

Answer

There are two ways I commonly break my cities:

Spending Money On Things Before Sims Want Them

Sims want things... schools, hospitals, parks... but they want some things more than others, and if you build them in the wrong order you are WASTING YOUR MONEY, because they don't have their full effect. On the quick reference guide, as well as buried deep in the Sim City Manual under the desirability chart, is possibly the most important information to the game that no one knows:

What (Sim City) Sims Want

Although you can’t directly affect the types of occupants that develop in your city, you do have indirect control by affecting the desirability of the zoned areas of your city. The following actions can be taken to improve the desirability for each of these occupant types:

This chart is ORDERED. Residential Sims want police more than hospitals. Dirty/Manufacturing industry wants police, then shorter fright trips, then NOTHING else, they're happy. After you've taken care of the basics that every zone wants, power and water for higher density/$$$, take care of problems in this order and you'll spend less money, attract more Sims, and make more money. I'll repeat once more:

I think this is the most important info people are missing to building a great city.

Not Replacing Dying Utilites

The utilities buildings, water pumps, power plants, and incinerators age over time, more for the more they are used. They gradually cost more to maintain and have lower output. Eventually, you are paying out the nose for nothing. Replace them as soon as you can.

Special note, if you are using Waste To Energy incinerators, turn them down to producing no power and have them only dispose of waste. This prevents the plant from aging in any noticeable amount, and you can then buy your power from a cheaper plant. The downside is that your power budget will not be at 100%, so 1) new plants will start at whatever the budget is set to overall, and 2) there is a chance of fire on all power lines. So just don't use any... use low density commercial zone instead. Same power spread, no cost, possible income.

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How to get large, healthy cities in Simcity 4?

Question

Every time I play Simcity 4, my cities usually end up broke and overpolluted by the time they reach 100k citizens. What's the best way to try and get a happy, healthy, and profitable large city?

Answer

There are two ways I commonly break my cities:

Spending Money On Things Before Sims Want Them

Sims want things... schools, hospitals, parks... but they want some things more than others, and if you build them in the wrong order you are WASTING YOUR MONEY, because they don't have their full effect. On the quick reference guide, as well as buried deep in the Sim City Manual under the desirability chart, is possibly the most important information to the game that no one knows:

What (Sim City) Sims Want

Although you can’t directly affect the types of occupants that develop in your city, you do have indirect control by affecting the desirability of the zoned areas of your city. The following actions can be taken to improve the desirability for each of these occupant types:

This chart is ORDERED. Residential Sims want police more than hospitals. Dirty/Manufacturing industry wants police, then shorter fright trips, then NOTHING else, they're happy. After you've taken care of the basics that every zone wants, power and water for higher density/$$$, take care of problems in this order and you'll spend less money, attract more Sims, and make more money. I'll repeat once more:

I think this is the most important info people are missing to building a great city.

Not Replacing Dying Utilites

The utilities buildings, water pumps, power plants, and incinerators age over time, more for the more they are used. They gradually cost more to maintain and have lower output. Eventually, you are paying out the nose for nothing. Replace them as soon as you can.

Special note, if you are using Waste To Energy incinerators, turn them down to producing no power and have them only dispose of waste. This prevents the plant from aging in any noticeable amount, and you can then buy your power from a cheaper plant. The downside is that your power budget will not be at 100%, so 1) new plants will start at whatever the budget is set to overall, and 2) there is a chance of fire on all power lines. So just don't use any... use low density commercial zone instead. Same power spread, no cost, possible income.

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What affects the pricing of neighbour deals?

Question

I have a mainly commercial city which currently supplies its own water and power. I would like to outsource it to a neighbouring city. However, this would cost $2k/mo more than generating it in the city, which is significantly larger than my current budget surplus, and even more expensive than wind power. What affects the price charged in neighbour deals?

Answer

1. The neighbor current needs - If they badly need power, they will sell it very expensive or not sell it all. If they produce more than they can use, they'll sell it cheaply. Same goes for water, trash and others.

2. Your city needs - If you need a lot of power, they'll sell for more, since you'll probably pay more. Surplus and demand, simply put.

3. Other deals you have with that city - if you have another deal that is favorable to them (that varies a lot) the price will probably lower.

4. Your city size - If your city is considerably bigger than the neighbor, they'll charge more. If it's considerably smaller, they'll charge less.

That is in order of importance: City size almost doesn't matter, but neighbor's needs matter a lot.

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