First, a glitch: invisible road pieces tearing craters through the terrain, which I hunt down and delete. Then the rebuilt highway gets tree lines as natural noise barriers, especially along the on-ramps, and pedestrians stop blocking the ramps thanks to an overpass and an underpass built with snapping turned off. Myrtle district fills in with high-rise and low-rise housing, offices, a college, a library and space kept free for a riverside park. In between: my hopes for parking, agents and realistic population in Cities: Skylines II at 65,000 citizens.
What happens in this episode
After the big highway rebuild in Episode 29, something weird appeared. The terrain was torn up as if by an earthquake, and I don’t have disasters active. It’s the third time I’ve seen this in Cities: Skylines 1.
How it was built
Hunting the ghost road
A broken piece of road was stretched across the map, visible but not clickable. I selected around it until I found the stray nodes, deleted the endpoint of the faulty ramp and rebuilt it:
- up to 12 levels;
- seven units, then five units;
- merging into the highway a little earlier, with sound barriers.
Trees as noise barriers
With the line tool I plant trees alongside the ramps and the redesigned highway. I’d completely forgotten to add a natural sound barrier for the new homes, and they lived with the noise for a while. On-ramps are the loudest, louder even than a highway without barriers, because vehicles speed up there.
Over and under
Pedestrians crossing at the ramps stopped traffic. Without Anarchy active, I turned off snapping and guides and squeezed in a pedestrian overpass at about 18 m, with a pole stepping down to 9 m and then to the ground. The ramps still worked. An underpass at −9 m followed, and people used it right away. TM:PE bans crossings at highway entry and exit points, and I edit lane connections at a junction, which I usually avoid.
Parking and Cities: Skylines II
Cars popping out of parking lots add to the load. The CS2 dev diaries talk about every car needing a place to park, and they seem to show curbside parking on one side only. That’s exciting. I want controllable parking, but cars parked by small rural houses are realistic too. I haven’t anticipated a game this much in years.
Filling Myrtle district
The district gets:
- high-rise residential, offices and low-density commercial corners;
- a fire station, a doctor, a school, a public library and a college;
- no high-rise by the river, where a park will go.
I keep accidentally zoning the future park square. I’m also slightly worried CS2’s agent simulation will push my PC. At 65,000 citizens Springvalley looks like it should hold half a million. A realistic population is my priority (here’s my Realistic Population tutorial), and so is my dream of rebuilding parts of Tokyo.
Wrap-up
Larger service buildings cover education, traffic flows, and the toll booth still makes no real difference. Only the riverside park is still missing.
Video chapters
- 00:00Hunting a ghost road glitch
- 04:35Rebuilding the merge
- 08:51Trees as noise barriers
- 13:08A pedestrian overpass
- 18:42Underpass and crossing bans
- 23:19Parking in Cities: Skylines II
- 27:22Commercial, college and library
- 32:27Agents and realistic population
- 37:08Bigger services, closing the circle
- 42:10Myrtle district filled in
Clicking a chapter starts the video above at that point.
FAQ
What causes strange craters and stretched terrain in Cities Skylines?
Sometimes a broken road segment ends up stretched far across the map. Select around the area, find the stray nodes and delete the segment where it starts.
Which roads are the loudest in Cities Skylines?
On-ramps are noisier than the highway itself because vehicles accelerate there. Plant trees along ramps as natural sound barriers for nearby homes.
How do you squeeze a pedestrian overpass next to a ramp?
Turn off snapping and guides, raise the path to about 18 m over the highway, add a pole to step down to 9 m and then to ground level.