Confused with road hierarchy

[GmanUK1965]

I've watched a few videos on road hierarchy as I find not adhering to this is where some of my problems are occurring. All the videos say that collector roads have to be medium roads and this is where I get confused:

At the start of the game there are small roads of which there are several options and medium roads available but the latter has only one option at the moment.

Alterial roads must have to use the only available medium road as alterial roads are needed immediately at the start of the game and small roads are too small and cannot hold lots of traffic

If this medium road is used for alterial roads then surely collector roads wouldn't use the same medium road as they contain slower traffic to alterial roads.

Could someone explain this to me?

[GmanUK1965]

I might of worked this out but I am not sure. I have reached level 1 and both my Alterial and Collector roads are the same medium road type. When I reach level 2 I can unlock large roads that have 6 lane (3 each way) that I could upgrade my Alterial road to. Would this be a correct way to do this?

[jk2l]

it is less about road type but more about where the road used and where it lead.

road hierarchy you pretty much break down to 4 types, highway, arterial, collector, local.

highway is high speed road. it is design to allow traffic from one location to another location in high speed. but because of the speed you don't want too many intersection so there require entry/exit point (also should be far away from each other to not interrupt the flow)

arterial is where the main road that lead from highway into different district, it connect each major district to each other (e.g. residential district, commercial shopping area, industrial zone...etc). it is often a large road for big city but for rural area arterial can also be just simple two lane road. road type really depends on your demand, because it is act as a major road for like people go to work, go to shopping...etc it often use large road but it is also depends on the population.

then you have collector roads that is the major road within your district that allow lot of small local area (each neighborhood). this can be high or low traffic really depends what it is.

and local road is just the roads within that small neighborhood. so those normally is small road because they don't expect high traffic volume. speed also depends on the zone but local road often serve residential or any school...etc that may have cars come in/out from building so road speed should be low

[GmanUK1965]

I already kind of knew most of that but cheers for the info.
I have unlocked large roads now so have changed the one arterial road I have so far to a large median road

[jk2l]

Originally posted by GmanUK1965:

I already kind of knew most of that but cheers for the info.
I have unlocked large roads now so have changed the one arterial road I have so far to a large median road

well my point is don't think about what road type for what road but think about the demand it will need. you can snap down large road for all arterial but it's just unrealistic if it is an arterial for rural area.

there isn't really a one method fit for all. and if the demands fit, collector and arterial using the same road type isn't uncommon either

[john.glossop]

There's an article called "The Ultimate Traffic Guide" somewhere on the paradox site. It should answer most of your questions. I think you'll find it under Guides at the right of the header bar for this game.