Building a Realistic Small Town in Cities: Skylines 2

TL;DR · 要点

The Board of Decision Makers hands over 33.5 million and one task: a profitable first settlement. The episode builds a highway link, a small historic town centre with North American historic buildings, gravel roads to a farm and a cemetery, an industrial strip by the river and a fenced trailer park — then tests the traffic.

What happens in this episode

Horizon Springs is the second run of the One Tile at a Time format. Cedarpoint County had to end because its save broke, most likely because of a few mods that didn’t play well together, so this map starts on 1 January 2026 with as few mods as possible. The map is based on Daybreak by Derver.

There’s a new frame for the series as well: a fictional Board of Decision Makers sets the goal and the budget for every tile. For the first one, the board hands over 33.5 million with one task: build a profitable first settlement that the rest of the county can grow from. The long-term plan is at least two cities plus one or two smaller settlements supporting the local industry, with traffic flowing between them.

The plan for the first tile is drawn on the map before anything is built: the tile border, the wind direction, an industrial area across the river and green circles for the first homes. The wind blows from the industry towards the town, which is a risk I take knowingly and might have to fix later.

How it was built

A highway link that fits the terrain

The two-lane highway needs a clean junction, and that only works after some landscaping. I use the slope tool so the new roads follow the terrain without extra bridges, since there’s already one long bridge to the industrial bank. The two-lane road I first laid along the river turned into a local highway: nothing will be built along it, so it doesn’t need to be a street.

Road hierarchy for a small historic town

From the local highway, two-lane roads and alleys form a clear hierarchy, with a small roundabout at the heart of the historic district. The Traffic mod is the only gameplay mod here. I use it to remove turns that would let drivers make dangerous or odd manoeuvres. The district is mostly homes, with a few shops, offices, services and a school.

Gravel roads for the countryside

Gravel roads lead along the river, through the forest and under the bridge before reconnecting to the highway. One is for services and later a cemetery; the other, closer to the river, is for farms and a few rural homes. A small bridge up the cliff gives traffic a second way to the industrial area, and an underpass below the highway gives a third route back into town.

Main Street with North American historic buildings

The historic centre uses the North American historic buildings. They remind me of small towns in the Appalachian or Blue Ridge Mountains, where old houses stand right next to modern shops and even workshops. To stay profitable from the start, the zoning is only residential and mixed residential-commercial. The hardest part was finding historic buildings with matching heights and roof types, and some gaps had to be filled with whatever fit best.

City services stay minimal: an elementary school, a fire station, a police station and a doctor’s office. Trash and other basic services come from outside connections until a bigger city can serve the whole county.

Industry with room to breathe, and the first farm

A few warehouses and manufacturing buildings go into the industrial zone with plenty of space between them, so backyard parking can be added later without demolishing anything. Further along the gravel road, a flattened plot takes a grain farm. A chicken farm would have been my first choice, but its main building was too big for the spot without moving the river. The farm gets overhead power lines, which suit the countryside better than buried cables.

The Sunset trailer park

The most fun part of the episode. A free spot along a gravel road becomes a fenced trailer park and cheap campground for people who can’t afford the motels on Main Street. It gets a riverbed texture underneath, a different texture under the fence line, an entrance, three cheap single-family homes, its own district (Sunset Trailer Park) with policies, and a lot of props. Later in the episode a police car stops by after the first crime there.

Detailing and a first traffic test

The rest of the episode is detailing: varied setbacks so homes don’t all sit at the same distance from the road, different grass textures between buildings for a realistic top-down view, small squares with trees, hedges, and roadside stopping places along the country road made with the texturing tool plus white lines from the net lanes tool. The cemetery gets a gravel parking lot with a concrete surface. The industrial zone gets concrete and dirt patches, because no real industrial area is spotless.

The first traffic test shows the usual queues at the highway ramps when everyone moves in at once. That’s normal at the start and settles down; whether the road network needs upgrading will depend on how much commuting the bigger cities create later.

Video chapters

Clicking a chapter starts the video above at that point.

FAQ

Which map is Horizon Springs?

A map based on Daybreak by Derver from Paradox Mods. The first tile sits by a river with the industrial area on the far bank and the wind blowing towards the town.

What is the Board of Decision Makers?

A fictional council I use to structure the series. Each episode starts with its mandate: a budget and a goal for the next tile. For the first episode that was 33.5 million and a profitable first settlement.

Why did Cedarpoint County end?

The Cedarpoint save became unusable, most likely because a few mods didn't work well together. Horizon Springs started on 1 January 2026 with as few mods as possible.