Bug: Land Costs and AI's selection of land

[David]

And what about the fact that factories are built in the center of the city ?

It could be due to the AI's consideration of the freight costs and it always try to minimize the distances between farms, factories and retail stores, to minimize freight costs.

In fact, the AI actually tends to build on the outer ring of the downtown, instead of exactly in the downtown.

[mwyeoh]

It could be due to the AI's consideration of the freight costs and it always try to minimize the distances between farms, factories and retail stores, to minimize freight costs.

In fact, the AI actually tends to build on the outer ring of the downtown, instead of exactly in the downtown.

I agree with Inarius that there should be some sort of penalty for building farms or factories in the middle of a city. Perhaps a 'council rates' penalty to farms and factories to increase monthly costs.
This monthly cost could simply be a percentage based formula based on how much the land's value is above the 'open land' cost.

Eg- Base land is $5 million.
If you build in a location costing $5.5 million, using a percentage of 10%, your monthly cost increases by $50,000
If you build in a location costing $7 million, using a percentage of 10%, your monthly cost increases by $200,000
If you build in a location costing $10 million, using a percentage of 10%, your monthly cost increases by $500,000

To use this successfully, the AI will need to be able to use the 'relocate business' button

The penalty would not apply to retail, commercial or residential buildings

[Inarius]

It's not a problem for me of tax. The system has to be simple.

Price of lands are determined by demand.

In appartments and commercial details, there is a "Green" bar.

If you build a factory near (the level of "near" can be quite large. The nearer the plan,the stronger the effect) an appartment or commercial, the level of green should drop dramatically and take into account this.

As an effect, prices of lands should lower as well as rent asked for these appartment and factory.

The only way of maintain high level of rent would be to destroy or to avoid factories around.

It would then simulate the gentrification of the city centers.

[David]

It's not a problem for me of tax. The system has to be simple.

Price of lands are determined by demand.

In appartments and commercial details, there is a "Green" bar.

If you build a factory near (the level of "near" can be quite large. The nearer the plan,the stronger the effect) an appartment or commercial, the level of green should drop dramatically and take into account this.

As an effect, prices of lands should lower as well as rent asked for these appartment and factory.

The only way of maintain high level of rent would be to destroy or to avoid factories around.

It would then simulate the gentrification of the city centers.

You're right. This is already being simulated in the game as described above.

By the way, the AI actually built factories on the borders between suburbs and downtown where the cost is lower than downtown. The city then grows and the downtown area expands. This might give an impression that the AI choose to build in downtown, but in fact, the AI will never build factories or R&D centers in center downtown.

[Inarius]

This might give an impression that the AI choose to build in downtown, but in fact, the AI will never build factories or R&D centers in center downtown.

This is already my impression

[David]

You may try building your factories in different locations in different games and post your observations here - which location makes better business sense in the short run and in the long run.

In fact, I am thinking about creating some web pages on Capitalism Lab web site about topics like above, which may be interesting to read as there are more than one way to do things like above and there are several viewpoints to evaluate and judge them.

[baz]

Interesting conversation, and I do forget that this is a US game and not a European game. Europe has generaly been built on commercial centers, reserdential outer ring and then on the outside Industrial. IE imagine 3 circles with the commercial in the center. and the industrial been the last circle surrounding the city with resedential inbetween them. Not that this matters as it's only a game.
In the US, don't you have resedential zones, that can only be resedential? Or can a land developer buy a huge peice of resedential land and then bulldoze it and build industrial units instead?
Do the industrial sector try and buy land as near to the commercial sector as possible? Personally I don't worry about how the city looks, but I did find in CAP 2 that when a huge competitor went bust it left the city almost house and apartment free, other than my apartments. It then caused the city to crash in population, which in turn finished my game as you can only sell so much to so few. Thankfully the apartment problem has been resolved with the manage button, which i LOVE.
Do the houses in CAPLAB have a population attched to them or are they cosmetic?

[David]

Do the houses in CAPLAB have a population attched to them or are they cosmetic?

Yes, low-rise houses have a population attached to them as well.

[baz]

Yes, low-rise houses have a population attached to them as well.

My only issue is what I mentioned in my previous post. In my CAP2 game and looking at the pics supplied in this thread the city center does get taken over by farms and industry, When these companies go bust ( Assuming they do ) it does leave the city centers very sparse. Is there away to control the apartments from going too. As mentioned before in CAP 2 it was very difficult to control apartments, I used to sell them too the CPU ( I know that this issue has been resolved) but if a computer goes bust it will still strip the city of huge population. Without the apartments been protected in some way, and the low rise houses gone, if I play the game the way I like, it will happen again, especially if I'm not able to buy, say a company that has huge resedential portfolio's.
If I think logically, would a company that went bust knock down the houses, apartments or commercial buildings that it once owned. Usually the creditors, if there were any would get them, or at least the goverment would intervene or they maybe sold to the private market at a low rate. I don't really mind if they straight transfered to the private market but for them to disappear isn't great for longevity of the game or in pratice with the real world. Again i'm not worried that a city center is stripped of housing and what ever is built is built, it's more the concern of what happens when huge amounts of apartment blocks disappear and there's no low level housing (Huge population loss).

[David]

If I think logically, would a company that went bust knock down the houses, apartments or commercial buildings that it once owned. Usually the creditors, if there were any would get them, or at least the goverment would intervene or they maybe sold to the private market at a low rate.

This is a good point.

It is possible to change the game to behave as you suggested. But from the gameplay point of view, some players may actually want to see bankrupted AI companies releasing all their buildings from the land, allowing the player to have a chance of grabbing the valuable land plots in downtown.

Maybe you could set up a poll and see which way people prefer.