How to increase import to my city??

[Rysouke]

I have 3 harbours and 2 international cargo but i export way too much than import. So how does CS import/export system work?? Dont really understand it..

[egnap]

I can see nobody replied. It 's a shame i was waiting for clever and apropriate comments too. To my knowledge , i know that add motorways exits and entrances , add connexions to harbours , airports and add train stations with connected railways to external lines are the only means ... but it's difficult to grasp the effectiveness of each implement you apply.
Sorry i ve no more idea. Bye

[alexhst]

Specialized Industrial Areas and Commercial Areas import goods on their own if they need them. So if you have an industrial area zoned for example as a Forestry Specialization and there are no natural resources where you build it, they will import goods from other cities by truck, train and cargo ship. If you look up the information for "Outside Connection" you can see the Import and Export and the relevant Buildings.
Specialized Industrial Areas produce goods. So Commercial Buildings import goods if there isn't enough Specialized Industrial Area that produce goods.
Specialized Industries export if there aren't enough Commercial Areas that need these goods.
Hope I could help!

[Nellvan]

Originally posted by Rysouke:

I have 3 harbours and 2 international cargo but i export way too much than import. So how does CS import/export system work?? Dont really understand it..

alexbst explained it alread in detail, basically you only import what you really need. Building harbors or cargoterminals gives you more cargo capacity (for exports as well), build those as you need them. They allow you to get lots of traffic off the highways if you place and connect them right.

[Rysouke]

I have a scenario that i import mainly goods (general goods - purple color) and is about 1.5k and then notice a 2 or 3 commerical shop start to cry for "not enough goods to sell" so i waited and see if the import will increase or not since i got 3 harbour and 2 international train cargo but it dont seem to increase so i build a few more industrial and it solved this problem.

After that i see more ore products imported under the export and import info view but the value is about 100 plus only and based on the color mainly ordered by my specialized ore industry and i am use infinite ore and oil mod so my city wont run out of ore and oil. But they still import ore products.

I click on export info and saw mainly dark blue color on my ore industry so what does it mean?? Legend never show dark blue is what so i suspect is raw material - ore so is it correct?? But export view info said i do export ore product (light blue color) but i dont see the color on my ore industry..

So i am abit confused about the import and export view info...

[Erei]

The company you build as "specialized" industry (ore, oil, wood) are not always the producer of those goods. Sometimes they "refine" it into something. I think in goods.
You can see that easily, because they looks different, and the nearby raw material producer will deliver to them. And if none is available, they'll import it.
Also, you can see that when you don't have the mod, and the industry run out of resources, they'll turn all into this kind of industry, and start importing like crazy.

I think it's realistic in a way, for example, while wood is used to make furniture and all that, which is built by the "normal" industry ingame, it's also used to produce planks, and we buy them that way to.


Finally, for your commerce lacking of goods, it's not necessarily because of your lack of imports. It could be traffic related. The commerce receive their goods through the "donut" van you can see on the road. If you have traffic issue, they might never reach their destination, or be late.
Having a cargo train station near your commercial area is always a good idea, less traffic, faster, and easy access. Having an harbor on top of that is even better.

Even then, with flawless traffic, multiple transport access, you still have a commerce that will have the "no goods" pop up once in a while. No big deal if it's isolated and rare, usually it solves itself, or the store is replaced.

[Rysouke]

So basically specialized industry will have 2 kind of factory one is extract raw material and the other is make products. I do see the different of industrial.

As for commerce lack of goods, i think is not traffic related as my traffic is flowing good no congestion and only 2 red spots with high traffic flow. I do have internal trains connect internally for more access to transfer goods and raw material around. But i admit at start i create a very small area of general industrial area only and my commerce area is bigger than industrial area.

But i do re-zone my industrial area to another location and also zone it down to smaller size for better traiffic around the area so i suspect a sudden move and cut affect the supply of goods to my commerce and also ordering from outside might take time. So maybe is also timing issue and just as commerce going to run of goods and at the same time, i do re-zone and downsize so getting from import also too little time for them to get the goods fast. But just only a 2 or 3 shops on n off happen only and i zone abit more industrial it solved this problem. So i think is pretty realistic.

[Rysouke]

However if there is info how much goods product and supply to shop will good so we can balance it out and play with the supply and demand of goods