Above is the city of Steveland. I've created this city many times as a demo or learning city on Cities Skylines, but this is the first time I've developed it in SimCity. As you can see in the above picture, it is a densely populated city of 370,000 people. What you can see above is considered the downtown or city center of Steveland, with the surrounding area expanding outward to create the overall metro area. I have built cities that are loosely based on real cities before (see London), as well as completely fictional cities (Westeros, which unfortunately I don't have any city journal entries for). What's interesting is that Steveland is a hybrid city. The regional map is of New York City, with the Steveland city center being where Brooklyn/Queens are located in reality. Following our recent trip to Boston, the city is heavily influenced by the real Boston. However, it has some influences from Chicago as well as lesser influences from London and even Indianapolis.
The picture above has signs that point out various landmarks throughout the city. The first thing that I want to point out is the identification of districts. This is a concept that exists in Cities Skylines as well as in real cities. In Skylines, you can apply various district ordinances and themes to the districts. You cannot do that in SimCity. However, I like the concept of districts and thus decided to create the South & North End districts, as well as the Airport and Park districts, Old Town, Central Loop, and the East & West Industrial districts. This is the first city I've ever built in SimCity to feature districts.
The picture above shows the Steveland Common. This is obviously a play on words of the Boston Common, but the point being is that there is a large, central park and green space in the middle of a densely populated city. This is a common city design approach, and many major cities throughout the United States feature such parks, including New York City (Central Park), Chicago (Grant), and St. Louis (Forest).
In the above picture is the Steveland Garden, this city's version of the Boston Garden. More importantly, however, is the North Station. Unlike NYC's Penn Station, Boston doesn't have a central station. Instead, it has a North and South station for its commuter and regional trains. I decided to loosely model my commuter train lines like Boston in terms of how there are two major stations in the downtown area, a North station and a West station. The subway and light rail network is a bit influenced by NYC, though there is a Chicago vibe, as shown on the transit map below. The purple line represents the Central Loop for the light rail network, just like Chicago's loop.
Some other features to point out in the picture with the signs is Steveland Park, this city's version of Fenway Park. Also, if you notice the interchanges on the highway are labeled as South Split, NW Split, etc. This is a nod to north and south split in Indianapolis. Also, the highways are labeled as M & A, followed by a number. This is a nod to the highway system nomenclature in the UK & London.
This concludes my introduction to Steveland. As you can see, it blends features from many different cities, some of my favorite cities in fact. Additionally, in the above picture you can see there is a lot of surrounding land available to develop the entire metro area. Up next in Steveland's City Journal is a project inspired by Cities Skylines and another first for me in SimCity - the cleaning up and reduction of air pollution.
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