Towns can't build inside other towns

[Derenzano]

Big towns keep building small houses inside small towns that are near them.

Shirowcito Transport, 24th Mar 2628 MARKED.png (65.83 KiB) Viewed 5542 times

See those small houses in the orange circles? They don't belong to Compiegne, they belong to its neighbouring cities.

Everything inside the yellow lines should belong only to Compiegne. The local authority should prevent other cities from building stuff inside their city limits.

This happens when two cities are connected by roads, and those roads are fully built. The algorithm that builds new houses will travel from BigCity to SmallCity and replace a skyscraper belonging to SmallCity with a small house belonging to BigCity. SmallCity will also do the same, but BigCity spawns houses much faster. The lost skyscrapers cause to SmallCity to shrink in size and spawn even less new houses. Imagine what happens when SmallCity is surrounded by four BigCities. In my case:

Compiegne. 1,617 habitants

To the North: Bayonne: 27,575
To the East: Agen 67.695
To the West: Le Mans 57,137
To the South: Orleans 21,031

The poor city of Compiegne gets bullied by its 4 neighbours, who keep building small houses inside its territory. Years ago it had 15,000 habitants.

Please add a check when building new houses: if the house is inside the skyscraper radius of a different town, then don't build anything. Or at least don't replace a big house with a small house.

[Eddi]

are you sure that's what happens? if a town is only 1600 inhabitants, why would it not build small houses by itself?

afair, after a town built on a tile, no other town will build on it, even if you clear the tile. (possibly building stations or industries may clear this claim, thouhg)

[kamnet]

Very curious!

Of course, this does happen in real life all the time, when one town starts growing larger and annexing the land on its borders.

[Derenzano]

are you sure that's what happens? if a town is only 1600 inhabitants, why would it not build small houses by itself?

Years ago that city had 15,000 inhabitants, it has been shrinking because the other cities keep building in their territory.

afair, after a town built on a tile, no other town will build on it, even if you clear the tile. (possibly building stations or industries may clear this claim, thouhg)

I looked at an older savegame where Compiegne still had 15,000 inhabitants, when I was still using version 1.5.0. There are many buildings belonging to Compiegne that now belong to other cities.

Compiegne in its old glory, before being bullied by neighbouring cities.

Shirowcito Transport, 2nd Nov 2433.png (169.73 KiB) Viewed 1490 times

[Voyager One]

are you sure that's what happens?

Actually, this is something I've been experiencing too but I've never thought it was something weird. I.e. in this scenario with two very large cities, green and red squares are their centers yet the "red" city "occupies" some territory all the way up to that red line. The "green" city didn't occupy any of the "red" city territory. I was bothered with that because it was screwing up the road layout of the "green" city. They both had approximately the same number of inhabitants and they have been receiving pretty much the same ammounts of cargos.

[Derenzano]

are you sure that's what happens?

Actually, this is something I've been experiencing too but I've never thought it was something weird. I.e. in this scenario with two very large cities, green and red squares are their centers yet the "red" city "occupies" some territory all the way up to that red line. The "green" city didn't occupy any of the "red" city territory. I was bothered with that because it was screwing up the road layout of the "green" city. They both had approximately the same number of inhabitants and they have been receiving pretty much the same ammounts of cargos.

Well, my cities are nearer to each other, and they don't have empty space to grow. I posted my savegame here.

[siu238X]

Just some trash:

If the algorithm is changed, such that if it encounters a road that is under the authority of another city, or even owned by another city, it stops and do nothing? That would eliminate I think 80% of the problem, e.g. in Mr. Derenzano's case, it's most likely that the roads around the square still belong to the small city.

[Alberth]

If A builds in B, then B also builds in A, so what's the problem?
Also, please remember this game is about transport, not about cities.

[Chrill]

What difference does it make, though? There are still houses there to transport passengers and mail to/from

[Voyager One]

What difference does it make, though? There are still houses there to transport passengers and mail to/from

This is true.

If A builds in B, then B also builds in A, so what's the problem?

The weird thing is that A built in B but B didn't build in A. Is that a bug or normal?

[kotssmurf]

What difference does it make, though? There are still houses there to transport passengers and mail to/from

Well actually what I've found is that when you create a station with a size relevant to the city's population, and the centre gets overgrown by a neighbour city thus heavily reducing its population, it can heavily affect your network.
Normally when I see a metropolitan region growing, I try to conserve the centre of the biggest city. Thus I create an Intercity (or HS) station close to it, which often ends up closer to a suburb.

Over time as the suburb and passenger flow grows, the station grows with it.
In this case when the main city overgrows the smaller ones; the high residential skyscrapers get replaced with smaller buildings.
The big station, local train routes, IC routes, timetables, infrastructure, .... become obsolete.


In the end you're left with a fancy station and lots of neatly scheduled routes which are useless

[YNM]

In this case when the main city overgrows the smaller ones; the high residential skyscrapers get replaced with smaller buildings.
The big station, local train routes, IC routes, timetables, infrastructure, .... become obsolete.


In the end you're left with a fancy station and lots of neatly scheduled routes which are useless

At least, you can change it into sort of Metro service within the invading town - I don't think thats make some loss

[kotssmurf]

At least, you can change it into sort of Metro service within the invading town - I don't think thats make some loss

Well that heavily depends on the size of both towns... It happens that you'd have a huge station surrounded by all small buildings.

[YNM]

Well that heavily depends on the size of both towns... It happens that you'd have a huge station surrounded by all small buildings.

Then resizing the station to a smaller one would result in more area for building, isn't ? To let the "dwarfed" town grow for a while, you can demolish the roads connecting it to the invading town, make a border (buy land or place objects), let the small one grow for a while. Then demolish the border. Finished

[siu238X]

What difference does it make, though? There are still houses there to transport passengers and mail to/from

Well actually what I've found is that when you create a station with a size relevant to the city's population, and the centre gets overgrown by a neighbour city thus heavily reducing its population, it can heavily affect your network.
Normally when I see a metropolitan region growing, I try to conserve the centre of the biggest city. Thus I create an Intercity (or HS) station close to it, which often ends up closer to a suburb.

Over time as the suburb and passenger flow grows, the station grows with it.
In this case when the main city overgrows the smaller ones; the high residential skyscrapers get replaced with smaller buildings.
The big station, local train routes, IC routes, timetables, infrastructure, .... become obsolete.


In the end you're left with a fancy station and lots of neatly scheduled routes which are useless

Indeed I think of a slightly more serious problem...

If the town local authority rating actually depends on whether a station serves the buildings under it, then over time the station would serve no purpose of improving that town's local authority rating. Of course, if it's the case that the rating effect counts only whether the *station* itself is under its authority, then this wouldn't pose a problem as big.

Now that this problem is addressed, I only connect towns with trams and rail, never letting their roads interconnect each other, unless they are already very convoluted and are of roughly equal size.


In any case, it would be nice to feature something that, if the expansion algorithm encounters something (building or roads) that's of another local authority, it should stop. Searching along players' roads should still be allowed, as some players prefer not letting towns build roads themselves.

[cirdan]

In any case, it would be nice to feature something that, if the expansion algorithm encounters something (building or roads) that's of another local authority, it should stop. Searching along players' roads should still be allowed, as some players prefer not letting towns build roads themselves.

Like this? (src/town_cmd.cpp:1337)

Code: Select all

/* Don't allow building over roads of other cities */
if (IsRoadOwner(tile, ROADTYPE_ROAD, OWNER_TOWN) && Town::GetByTile(tile) != t) {
        _grow_town_result = GROWTH_SUCCEED;
}

That code has been there for quite some time now.

[siu238X]

In any case, it would be nice to feature something that, if the expansion algorithm encounters something (building or roads) that's of another local authority, it should stop. Searching along players' roads should still be allowed, as some players prefer not letting towns build roads themselves.

Like this? (src/town_cmd.cpp:1337)

Code: Select all

/* Don't allow building over roads of other cities */
if (IsRoadOwner(tile, ROADTYPE_ROAD, OWNER_TOWN) && Town::GetByTile(tile) != t) {
        _grow_town_result = GROWTH_SUCCEED;
}

That code has been there for quite some time now.

I can't find the segment in concern in that file.

Meanwhile, that's just for roads, but I realize that sometimes players disallow towns building roads, which means if I connect two towns by myself the roads will always be mine. Therefore buildings (or at least the target building tile) have to be checked too. That wouldn't eliminate all "cross-boundary" buildings, but at least it would eliminate replacing one town building with another town's.

[PPT]

Quote;

"If the town local authority rating actually depends on whether a station serves the buildings under it, then over time the station would serve no purpose of improving that town's local authority rating. Of course, if it's the case that the rating effect counts only whether the *station* itself is under its authority, then this wouldn't pose a problem as big."

Maybe it's the settings that I use, but if I build 2 bus stops and run 2 buses I very soon have an outstanding rating.
As long as I do it before building train stations.

The kiss of death is to put in a train station and then wait a while to start sending trains to the station.
You will very quickly get a rating of appalling and probably will never be able to raise it.

Recently I had a problem with a city that I must have done something wrong with, though not building a train station before bus stations.
Somehow I got an appalling rating while every other city says that I an outstanding.

I decided that maybe I needed to move one of my 2 bus stations.
Unfortunately I removed before I built and the city wouldn't let me build another bus station.

So, now I have 2 buses and one station, so I have the buses shuttling between this city and it's close neighbor.
The city still hates me and I can't do anything about it because they refuse to allow me to fix the service.

As an experiment I have started trying to raise the train station's rating in that city to see if they will respond to that and let me put in some more bus stations.

The current train station rating is poor because it's still fairly new.


It's difficult to understand the train station rating, though.
There are no passengers waiting. At the two cities that come before it and after it on this line there are passengers waiting and their ratings are very good and mediocre. The same trains go to all three of these stations.

I think that city just doesn't like me.
Maybe it's my haircut or something.

HEY, the train station just went to mediocre and the city went from appalling to very poor.
YAY!, very poor.
They let me build some bus stations.

[siu238X]

Quote;

"If the town local authority rating actually depends on whether a station serves the buildings under it, then over time the station would serve no purpose of improving that town's local authority rating. Of course, if it's the case that the rating effect counts only whether the *station* itself is under its authority, then this wouldn't pose a problem as big."

Maybe it's the settings that I use, but if I build 2 bus stops and run 2 buses I very soon have an outstanding rating.
As long as I do it before building train stations.

The kiss of death is to put in a train station and then wait a while to start sending trains to the station.
You will very quickly get a rating of appalling and probably will never be able to raise it.

Recently I had a problem with a city that I must have done something wrong with, though not building a train station before bus stations.
Somehow I got an appalling rating while every other city says that I an outstanding.

I decided that maybe I needed to move one of my 2 bus stations.
Unfortunately I removed before I built and the city wouldn't let me build another bus station.

So, now I have 2 buses and one station, so I have the buses shuttling between this city and it's close neighbor.
The city still hates me and I can't do anything about it because they refuse to allow me to fix the service.

As an experiment I have started trying to raise the train station's rating in that city to see if they will respond to that and let me put in some more bus stations.

The current train station rating is poor because it's still fairly new.


It's difficult to understand the train station rating, though.
There are no passengers waiting. At the two cities that come before it and after it on this line there are passengers waiting and their ratings are very good and mediocre. The same trains go to all three of these stations.

I think that city just doesn't like me.
Maybe it's my haircut or something.

Actually town rating and station rating are two very different things. If a station is very overcrowded, I often get a "Very Poor" for the station but "Outstanding" for the town.

In your case I think there's no alternative other than bribing the local authority. At least if you fail you still get "Poor" and you can build one station or so.

By the game mechanism, you have to get two stations served in the town to cancel out the train station that you just plopped down and ignored. Otherwise the negative effect of the unserved station would outweigh your efforts.

[PPT]

But, then this happened;


"HEY, the train station just went to mediocre and the city went from appalling to very poor.
YAY!, very poor.
They let me build some bus stations."

That was at the end of my post.

The only thing that changed was more trains going to the station.
Both the station and the city rating increased and they let me build bus/tram stations.