How to start a new city?

[KeanoManu]

The one thing that I feel are the hardest in this game are to start a city. I often lose my interest because I fail to get a good start. Today's the latest of such occasions. I've had an urge to play the game for a while, and the upcomming expansion fuels the renewed interest in the game. But... After about 30 minutes of playing with my city I feel that I've lost much of the interest due to the fact that I don't really know how to start building.

The few times I've been able to get a good start I've continued and built really fun cities. But most of the time I quit a city after about an hour when I feel that the entry to the city didn't go well.

How do you guys here start your cities? We begin with a stretch of highway and an intersection where we are more or less told to start. I personally usually end up demolishing the existing intersection and build a new one on the same place. Everything leads into a roundabout (even though I dislikes them and would prefer to avoid using them). But then what?

An organic, non-squared layout from there? A rigid system of square blocks? Where to put all the services in the beginning? Do you put trash service in downtown or do you build a small industrial area far out of reach? Dense zoning right away or do you start with the suburbs?

It's probably not hard to see, but I'm the type of player who just likes to build in this type of game. I rarely go back to an existing area to change things. I just continue to expand.

Please share with me ideas on how to make the beginning of a new city more enjoyable. I've lost my motivation so many times before my city even reach 1.000 inhabitants.

 

[Sanny]

Start off with getting the essentials down like utilities etc then build a village. from that village build a town, from that keep expanding outwards.

Start small with suburbs. Only use high density when you know where the heart of the city is going to be.

As for trash that's a personal preference, I like to burn mine. Always keep it out of the city or in a dense industrial complex. Its a good idea to spread things out, don't want your residential close to major roads and industry and anything else that creates pollution.

 

[Teldaril]

Most times i use the first tile to unlock everything in a grid city and bulldoze everything when i have the squares and the money to rebuild it the way i want. I prepare before i start to build. I take the map and try to analyze where i want to build thematic areas. Industrial zones, commercial zones, harbor and airport. I roughly plan the layout of the highway and the railway. And with this greater plan in mind everything is more organic. I keep industrial zones in a grid because this way the traffic is better manageable for me.

I rarely go back to an existing area to change things. I just continue to expand.

I don't go back either. And that is why i need to prepare before i start. What exactly is the problem? Don't you like the visuals of your starting or do you have traffic issues? In my opinion the visuals increase with the size of the city. And the traffic issues can be handled by public transport for people and an lots of cargo train terminals and railways for industry <-> commercial.

 

[TimW]

At first, only low density zoning is available. I am following as close to a grid as possible while my next city build will mix grid and park-like planning. Decentralize your facilities, especially if your city is going to sprawl. Make sure you have utilities before you unpause. Be sure your first industrial area has quick access to and from the initial entrance.

 

[Daddl]

I only play on maps that don't offer you the space to create "boring" cities, with a lot of hills/mountains, rivers or coast. That way you can't just make grids that get bigger and bigger and need to adjust to the terrain.

I like to play with money enabled, but lately, I always start by creating a horrible mess, but only because I know I completely delete it later. Only two lane streets, directly attached to the highways, just rudimentary services, all the things you should never do. When the city hits 5500 people to get dense zoning (which takes like 10 minutes from the start) I start building properly somewhere else, and when enough cash is incoming I get back to the start zone and make something nice out of it.

What I'm struggling with is Highway off-ramps, I'm utterly uncreative regarding that, almost always ending them in a roundabout or just attaching at the corner of a street, and then spend a lot of time to fix the upcoming traffic problems later. Additionally, I always build way too dense, merely using the space of a few tiles when I use the mod to have 81...

When I go through YouTube I'm often like "Damn, why don't you build you cities as pretty?" But somehow I don't manage to do that.

 

[TrolKabu]

To keep the start enjoyable you can try several solutions, some of them already exposed above :
- Use a map that limits your expansion or makes it way more restrictive soon. Organic layout is often forced in this situation. The opposite of a flat map.
- Plan all things from start, taking into account the suburbs, industrial squares and their specializations, same for offices, the major ways and national exits and try to stick to it.
- Impose yourself a specific context, like no national connection except harbor/airport/whatever (can combine it with a map like this post). It often leads to interesting development and totally changes the way you plan your development. Obviously, if you want to start with it, you'll have to unlock all buildings, and perhaps use infinite money at start to make things manageable.
- Build it in a realistic/pretty manner. It's quite hard, but some people out there are masters of it and made many assets or connections to make it more appealing.
- Make it a theme park
- Mix all of the above

I personally started this game by playing it like SimCity 4, with big squares well planned and perfect service coverage, but it was soon boring (and kind of a waste of this mervelous engine).

Then I've tried "harder" maps, with many organic layouts and an emphasis on prettiness, but it was quite tedious sometimes (organic layouts often make services rather inefficient), and terribly time consuming (zoning is horrible on a full organic layout ).

I'm leading more and more to a mix of both, with organic suburbs or forestry/farming, and more planned downtown, or even separate towns with specific productions. Sometimes with buildings unlocked, sometimes not, but always with infinite money, as it ends to be more a time factor than anything else, because keeping the budget in a positive state is not especially challenging (and I can build a billion times the same road to make it the shape I want without having to wait for cash ). I still prefer "harder" maps though, mostly because they're prettier than a dull flat map and they force organic layout for the most part.

Also, it seems not to be your case, but as many others, I make it a point to keep a good traffic overall, and I often rearrange (without razing everything) some parts of my cities when an exansion increased the vehicle flow higher than the road (or rail) can support.

 

[muttonnoir]

You could use the village/neighbourhood/town/city where you live as a starting point. Starting on a small scale, you might try to improve it. Build another small neighbourhood/village at a natural point on the map- at a crossroads or where the road crosses a river or by the coast. Apply common sense- ask yourself lots of questions- where will I place this asset?, why in that spot? what are the advantages/disadvantages? Let things grow organically. If you place a railway station then as in real world scenarios businesses and residential developments will grow up around it. Just keep it real- look to real life examples for inspiration. Have fun- there is no right or wrong way to play the game. As in real life city planners can and do make horrible mistakes but remember you can redevelop areas if you choose. No city is ever complete- it is continually developing. Enjoy!

 

[Art1985]

I have seen some pictures with big farms in Skylines, can someone tell where I could find them to use in game?
I would like to try creating new city from vilage, but for this I need farms.

 

[muttonnoir]

Any big farms that you see in YT videos have been created from scratch using a range of mods/assets & props available on the Steam workshop. Unleash your creativity but be warned, It is a time consuming endurance test that will test your patience to the limit, but the end results can be very rewarding.

 

[Art1985]

Any big farms that you see in YT videos have been created from scratch using a range of mods/assets & props available on the Steam workshop. Unleash your creativity but be warned, It is a time consuming endurance test that will test your patience to the limit, but the end results can be very rewarding.

Oh.... no, I don't have such patience, I thought that there are some mods that give option to build them like in Cities XXL for example. But, thank you for the answer.