Cities: Skylines

Cities: Skylines

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Tips for Building a Realistic Custom Airport in C:S
By RootinTootinCowboy and 1 collaborators
This is intended to be a condensed guide on how to build a realistic, functioning airport in C:S, so you don't have to sift through pages of FAA regulations and charts.
   
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Introduction
This guide is intended to make use of the fantastic airport assets which have all been released lately. I made this guide so that the majority of the community would be able to create a realistic airport without having to sift through hundreds of pages of FAA charts and regulations.
Airports serve as the gateways to countries and cities, combining multiple forms of local mass transit as well as highway and street connections. They are massive engineering projects which take a very long time to complete. Building a realistic airport in C:S is no different as it requires a lot of patience and a lot of detail.
Location, Location, Location....
First find a large open area to build your airport, flatten the terrain and make it COMPLETELY level (this is essential for markings later). Clear all trees and bushes from the area and pull back any highways/railways and completely clear the area. Most airports are located near water to allow open area away from population centers to work out problems.

Most maps at this point include a plane connection but always check before begining work.
Runway Layout
The most important part of any airport are its runways, they allow planes enough space to accelerate for takeoff as well as land. In real life runways face in the direction of prevailing winds (the direction the wind blows from most often) to avoid crosswinds. However, since crosswinds are non-existent in C:S we don't have to worry about this. When building your airport start with the runways and work in towards the terminal, this will ensure that you will have enough room for the runways at all times.Large airports usually have parallel runways to allow for simultaneous takeoffs and landings, somethins that will comein handy in C:S. Runways Should be about 2~2.75km in length, this is not long enough in real life but the wonky scale in C:S makes it look long enough. I would reccomend Precision Engineering to help with this.Use the plain road from Network Extenstions 2 to add a shoulder to the runways use Move It! to get rid of any texture clipping
Taxiways
Taxiways allow planes to exit the runway and move to and from terminals/aprons.The direction of the runway should be displayed by arrows and you'll to make a closed loop from both ends of the runway.If you follow the screenshot exactly and connect the taxiway at the end planes won't recognize it as a runway and wont land on it. To solve this disconnect the taxiway from the end of the runway and place a taxiway at a 90 degree angle from the end of the runway instead of 180.
High speed taxiways as show above allow planes to exit the runway faster than normal since it is set at an angle in most cases this in is 30 degrees off the runway.Bsquicklehausen's A380 props work well as a metric to gauge the distance between taxiways
Runway Markings
Threshold markings indicate the end of a runway and the number of vertical lines indicate the width of a runway I'm using Vasimr22's airport markings and will be using most of his props in this guide. Using the white lines provided I create 2 24m sets of eight lines with a space in the middle. I use move it to copy and paste this at the endof the black tarmac on each runway. I then use Ploppable Asphalt with these settings to fill the gap.






This is where things get kind of complicated, but this should be much easier to understand than the complex aviation jargon used in FAA guidelines. In this guide I will show how to make a realistic threshold (end of the runway) and a displaced threshold. A displaced threshold is commonly used at airports where approaching planes must clear an obstacle at the end of the runway, planes don't land on a displaced threshold since it is not stregnthend for such, but planes are able to takeoff and roll out on a displaced threshold. It is made up of 4 arrows without lines along the bottom of the threshold, then (depending on how long the displaced threshold is) white arrows with a long disconnected tail along the centerline. Next we'll do the runway numbers, which are between 0-360 (which makes a circle) and the numbers are the heading of the runway divided by 10 so a runway with a heading 240 will be runway 24. The opposite heading is obtained by adding or subtracting 18,
if the number is above 18 subtract,
and if below add. So 24-18=6 therefore the opposite end will be runway 6.The letters L, R, C (Left, Right, Center) represent the position of the runway parallel to other runways as viewed by an approaching aircraft. Since this runway is parallel to another and is on the right side it becomes 24 R.
Last but not least are the precsion approach markings, these serve to guide pilots when landing to ensure they have enough runway to stop. The three white bars go first, these indicate the start of the touchdown zone, the large white rectangle is the aming point, this is where the pilot wants the wheels of the plane to hit the ground. The two sets of two smaller rectangles are the fixed distance markings which are at 1500 and 2000ft down the runway. Finally there are the end of the touchdown zone markings at 2500ft down the runway.
Lighting
Lights (rather obviously) allow airports to function at night. In this section we'll go over approach lighting. The most common type of approach lights at large international airports in the ALSF-1, ALSF-2, or MALSR (this last one should be used when the aiport is in a confined area such as a city). for the purpose of this guide we will build a simplified ALSF-1 system using Vasimr22's approach lights. We start by drawinga straight road dirt road from the end of the runway, this to make sure the runway lights are in a straight line. The we place the lights with the shortest ones closest to the runway and the tallest ones farther away. White lights should go down the center with red lights to the left and right, until the decision bar (used in low visibility conditions) where the red lights are capped by as set of whitle lights.In real life this system features another set of white lights placed halfway from decsion bar to the end of the runway inbetween the red and white. However,
given the rather unrealistic width of runways in game this would end up being much wider than the runway itself.Next are the PAPI or precision appreoach path inidicator provide a visual of the aircraft relative to the glideslope of the runway (making sure the plane is aimed at the aiming points to allow for enough stopping distance). These can go on the left or right side of the runway and should be aligned with the aiming points on the runway. The lights should face in the direction of approach.
Terminal Layout and Ramp/Apron Markings
This part is not intended to go into great detail on terminal layout, just a few basics, for inspiration look at real life airports and see which best suits your location and available space.
Jetway or Jetbridges ALWAYS go on the left side of the plane, the passenger entry door is on that side so it would make sense for it to be on the left.
Ramp markings are in place to indicate where certain gates or locations are such as the one shown below, which shows that gates A1-8 and B1-8 are along this taxiway.
In Conclusion
In the end it is up to you on what you want your airport to look like, there are a wide variety of airports in the world with all kinds of layouts. This guide serves to get the ball rolling when it comes to custom airports. If you like to go further in depth when comes to airport design I would recommend this short hand version of FAA guidelines[www.faa.gov]. Good luck with you designs!
29 Comments
AnotherGuy Dec 6, 2020 @ 8:43am 
Little bit not clear about the taxiway where to put any clearer photo can share with me? So that I can get a clear picture
RootinTootinCowboy  [author] Oct 13, 2020 @ 9:38am 
you really can't just search for airports and look at what's the most popular
K. McKenzie Oct 12, 2020 @ 11:34am 
OK, Dumb question, but where do I find all the workshop things for this in one place?
RootinTootinCowboy  [author] Oct 12, 2020 @ 8:08am 
no this was made well before mass transit it's all on the workshop
K. McKenzie Oct 11, 2020 @ 1:45pm 
Where do you even get the runways and taxiways? Do you have to buy Mass Transit, or are there Community Workshop things I need to get?
TurtleShroom Sep 2, 2020 @ 11:47am 
How do I connect the Pedestrian Pathway to the Plane Stand or other part where the aircraft parks?
Detail Oct 9, 2018 @ 8:58am 
how do you position the taxiways for planes to go to the gate and then be able to push back and reverse direction if the taxiways are only one way?
Ananse Sep 26, 2018 @ 6:27pm 
how do you get the planes to use the full runway?
Captain James Apr 26, 2018 @ 6:19pm 
Thanks! I'll check it out
RootinTootinCowboy  [author] Apr 26, 2018 @ 6:43am 
I'd give it about 2km it gives the planes enough time to decend.