Starting a new city feels impossible.

[LetsNotPlease]

I've only ever managed to get 3 real cities going in this game, because I have crippling creative block at the beginning of every new save. I hate the way the highways are laid out as two different roads on new maps (not to mention how you can't even use the same type of highway yourself until later) and I have no idea how to branch off from two one way highways into a small town. The few times I've managed to get the ball rolling the game is a ton of fun, but I can't ever surpass the hurdle. How do you get a new city going?

[Sol]

By placing water, sewage, power, and setting up my starting area.

There are Assets which contain grids, highway ends, and Mods that let you start at say - Boom Town instead.

[~\\Savarast//~]

If you really want all roads right away theres a mod called "unlock all roads" but it really isn't necessary. I usually spend a hour or so thinking about where I see the city going and planning how to best use the miniscule budget you start with. You can also get tons of inspiration and tips from watch the youtube veterans like Biffa, Sam Bur, and Imperial Jedi

[LetsNotPlease]

I just feel like it's impossible to transition from that highway to a town without always doing a roundabout in the center and a triad of districts in a tiny circle. It's really hard to internalize plans without having the ability to presketch with roads for free or something to lay things out. I'm probably over-complicating things.

[~\\Savarast//~]

Sometimes I'll start a new city and save before anything. That way I can "sketch out" roads and services. Then I just load back and do what I decided is the best.

Roundabouts are a good start but I can get that they might feel formulaic. You can also use batteries or whatever you'd call the start the Imperial Jedi usually starts with:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uwj2ZiiFSs

[Sol]

I downloaded a bunch of intersection assets from Arasandi, HorizonBC, Impact, and several others. Go into your map in Map Editor, delete the crappy roads. Now, imagine your own city here - start by placing 3-4 really cool intersections, 3 and 4-way to make an external ring highway, and a few roads that cut into it. Then, connect the dots with those awesome intersections. What you want to happen is, you will develop your vision for a map as you're doing this. So when you start a new game, you already have a plan and just need to start.

I recently did this with The Great Plan, love the map and concept, hate the default roads. Doing this gave me inspiration for how I want my city to generally function.

[HayManMarc]

What I've done in the past is just connect the ends of the freeway to a road and extend that road to where I want to build the city. It looks dumb, but functions just fine. When the city is big enough and making enough money, I go back and rework the freeway roads to look better.

[Miiiiiiiiiiiiike]

I start one part a bit of a hap-hazard sort of place. Put down some 2 way roading off each motorway piece and a bit of a grid section and away I go.

As time progresses and I get more money and buildings unlocked I start to plan new areas a little better with relation to transport and amenities.

The great thing about this is that you can simply bulldoze any existing part of the city and change it to how you like later on in the game. In real life it would be hard to bulldoze half a city.

You hardly need any special roads at the start. I find trucks going to/from industry are the biggest transport issue, but that tends to start occuring for me at 20k population. The normal 2 lane roads are sufficient for low density residential.