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Related to that is all the angst about how Sim City basically just lets you make car-centric hellscapes, not at all unlike San Jose, the city in which it was bi

Related to that is all the angst about how Sim City basically just lets you make car-centric hellscapes, not at all unlike San Jose, the city in which it was birthed. And City Skylines inherited a lot of that legacy, that designs centered around mass transit and cycling (such as one would find in Europe or Japan) really only become fully practical with a bunch of mods installed.

uxp8u61q 3y ago
The whole game of City Skylines is based around a grid-shaped city and clearly delineated zones for housing, commerce, and industry. It's never going to be able to model a European city (or an old east coast US for that matter).
notahacker 3y ago
Its not just the car centric hellscapes, but the assumption the only way a local authority exerts any control over building is zoning (for residential or commercial, never both), the grid, the assumption that high density means towers with parking lots in between, the lack of any social housing (and indeed the assumption low income workers are entirely unnecessary to a properly functioning city), the assumption that the best way to make your city really attractive is regressive taxation to attract the rich and scare away the poor etc etc...
josephg 3y ago
I visited Amsterdam recently and instantly noticed something weird about the road layouts there. I did some research - they differentiate between streets (meant for short distances, or getting to a local destination) and roads (meant for long distance travel - or driving past a location). As a visitor, it seems brilliant. And it makes way more sense than what a lot of roads look like here - with cyclists trying to fit in with high speed traffic. Novel approaches to urban planning seems like an obvious thing to put in to urban planning games. What a missed opportunity.
- TRiG_Ireland 3y ago
  Urban planners have coined the word "stroad" for the hybrid monstrosities.
- mikepurvis 3y ago
  I’ve noticed this a number of times in recent travel— Kyoto, New Orleans, Quebec City, all very old places where the narrow side streets (often with little to no sidewalk and certainly no dedicated bike space) are in fact a paradise for walking and biking, despite what you might think listening to some urbanism advocacy.

uxp8u61q 3y ago

The whole game of City Skylines is based around a grid-shaped city and clearly delineated zones for housing, commerce, and industry. It's never going to be able to model a European city (or an old east coast US for that matter).

notahacker 3y ago

Its not just the car centric hellscapes, but the assumption the only way a local authority exerts any control over building is zoning (for residential or commercial, never both), the grid, the assumption that high density means towers with parking lots in between, the lack of any social housing (and indeed the assumption low income workers are entirely unnecessary to a properly functioning city), the assumption that the best way to make your city really attractive is regressive taxation to attract the rich and scare away the poor etc etc...

josephg 3y ago

I visited Amsterdam recently and instantly noticed something weird about the road layouts there. I did some research - they differentiate between streets (meant for short distances, or getting to a local destination) and roads (meant for long distance travel - or driving past a location). As a visitor, it seems brilliant. And it makes way more sense than what a lot of roads look like here - with cyclists trying to fit in with high speed traffic. Novel approaches to urban planning seems like an obvious thing to put in to urban planning games. What a missed opportunity.

TRiG_Ireland 3y ago
Urban planners have coined the word "stroad" for the hybrid monstrosities.
mikepurvis 3y ago
I’ve noticed this a number of times in recent travel— Kyoto, New Orleans, Quebec City, all very old places where the narrow side streets (often with little to no sidewalk and certainly no dedicated bike space) are in fact a paradise for walking and biking, despite what you might think listening to some urbanism advocacy.