Demand for Industry/Commercial but thousands open jobs?

[Jan2607]

My City is asking for more industrial and commercial zoning, but my population drops and only 15k people are emloyed while I have 18k jobs available. Many of the commercial buildings lacking workers.
So in my opinion there should be a demand for residental zoning instead.
Why is there a demand for the other zonings?

[grapplehoeker]

You haven't provided much detail, but given that it is still a small town, it could be that depending on the level of your businesses and the education of your population, there is a skill mismatch. In other words you have many uneducated workers 'demanding' a place to work eg.industry and you may have many educated workers 'demanding' a place to work eg. commercial.
It doesn't matter. What is evident is that you have more workplaces than you have qualified or unqualified Cims to fill them. So, ignore the demands and focus on growing your population and educate them. Yes, educate them all. I know you'll say,
'What about the industry jobs that require uneducated workers?'
Education will pay off and will benefit your city as a whole.
Increase your population and aim for 10% unemployed. When unemployment is this high, then even educated Cims will fill uneducated vacancies if there are no other preferred vacancies for them.
There is an important thing to remember too. The RCI demand meter is only there to show you that there is enough demand to build something if you, the mayor, wish to build it. It does not mean that it must be built, just that it can be.
You are the city builder, the planner and the architect, so don't let the RCI dictate to you what should be built. You decide how much commercial you want in your city. That will determine how much industry is necessary to supply it, so generally you need to limit the amount of commercial to a minimum.
Hope that helps ;)

[Jan2607]

Thank you :)
Can I really ignore the RCI? I noticed that if there is no demand for residential zones, no one will build homes in new zones.

[grapplehoeker]

Originally posted by Jan2607:

Thank you :)
Can I really ignore the RCI? I noticed that if there is no demand for residential zones, no one will build homes in new zones.

Patience...
If you build it, even a little at time, they will come ;)
Remember, you have generations of Cims growing up and if they are happy, they'll stay in your city and will raise families of their own, which of course will require new homes. So, just wait for your city to grow naturally and in time, new housing will be built and occupied.

[jdlech]

The one thing I noticed about the game. The demand bars is for new zoning. So your industrial demand is for new zones, not more industrial jobs or buildings. A low residential demand may mean you have lots of empty or partially empty residential buildings. Even if you have droves of people moving into your city, your demand bar may still be quite low. And you may have a high demand for new industrial zoning even when your employment rate is already high.
I've taken to laying the road system for large areas, then zone one block at a time to keep all three demands less than high. This produces a more consistent growth rate.