Managing city growth

[Osric]

Hi guys. I'm hoping someone can help me with this. I have been playing for several years PAK128 Britain and love it, but always have a problem with sprawling city growth. Is there a way to say limit city growth to areas with station coverage? I have tried boxing cities in with electric wires but that is an unsatisfactory arrangement, and no good with eras prior to electrification. What I'd really like to do is say  manage city growth by setting up a new station with a road network and have the expansion occur only within the established road network and all further growth limited to increasing population density rather than endless low density urban sprawl. Perhaps this could be achieved by preventing the AI constructing its own roads? Any ideas to manage this issue would be gratefully received as dealing with an endless sprawl of low density housing always ruins the game for me.

[prissi]

You can have a modified tab of rules for city growth. However, then city growth will already fail at the start and you need to grow the city manually.

[Spenk009]

There is an option for preferring to replace existing buildings rather than build new ones. This is found in cityrules.tab, but not in the game windows.

Code Select Expand

# citys will not growth further along exiting roads, if the buildings density is lower (in percent)
minimum_building_desity = 33

Have a look at lowering this value. Less sprawling cities should result.

[DrSuperGood]

There is an option for preferring to replace existing buildings rather than build new ones. This is found in cityrules.tab, but not in the game windows.

Code Select Expand

# citys will not growth further along exiting roads, if the buildings density is lower (in percent)
minimum_building_desity = 33

Have a look at lowering this value. Less sprawling cities should result.

I think that value controls if the city will expand borders or build up based on the area occupied. The lower the value the more a city will sprawl as the less dense it has to be before expanding borders.

[Spenk009]

I think that value controls if the city will expand borders or build up based on the area occupied. The lower the value the more a city will sprawl as the less dense it has to be before expanding borders.

Slightly confusing, but that was my initial interpretation of the value.

[Aquin]

There is a parameter called "Renovation Percentage" in cityrules try raising that one.

[DrSuperGood]

Either renovation percentage is unused in all paks (or bugged?) or pak64 has it set incorrectly. On Moblet's server game (standard pak64) the cities seem to 100% prioritize expansion over upgrading. This behaviour can be tiresome at times since you are forced to constantly expand services.

Maybe a mechanics change is required in the area? I feel that at least the central core (around the city centre) should be built up more heavily even if the city is encouraged to sprawl.

[Ters]

I have never experienced that cities only expand and never upgrade.

[bigliettiperfavore]

Maybe a different topic but; Is it possible to to have a single track line with (e.g.) 3 stations, and no passing loops/multi track stations? (And more than one train)

[DrSuperGood]

Maybe a different topic but; Is it possible to to have a single track line with (e.g.) 3 stations, and no passing loops/multi track stations? (And more than one train)

From what I have been told that is what the "Long block" signal is for since it will reserve through station stops until the next signal.

[Ters]

From what I have been told that is what the "Long block" signal is for since it will reserve through station stops until the next signal.

As long as there is something beyond the outermost station on the single track stretch. This would usually be a multi-tracked station or a passing loop, although if the three trains have different schedules, one might get something working with just a single track, perhaps with extra dummy stations. It would be a somewhat silly and inefficient setup, though.

[Burcak]

Maybe I update first question for me   I build road between cities or city and factory, but I don't change this road to cityroad during city growth. Is there any way to say "no city-building along this way"? High voltage transmision lines often looks terrible 

[Vladki]

There is an addon with fences, walls and barriers. Search for SNFOS addons.

[DrSuperGood]

Use tram track, that is what I do when I need no growth along a road (not in that direction). Next that that I just expand the city to cover the road and repeat once it expands past that. Check the Moblet server out for impressive large pak64 cities.

[Isaac Eiland-Hall]

SNFOS addons are really nice - note that they haven't been updated for half-height slopes, but you can always flatten tiles instead of going up slopes with them for now.

[Wuz314159]

Use tram track, that is what I do when I need no growth along a road (not in that direction). Next that that I just expand the city to cover the road and repeat once it expands past that. Check the Moblet server out for impressive large pak64 cities.

(For posterity's sake:)
Sleeper rails in sand do the exact same job @ 1/10 the maintenance cost.