Real City 99

[Azalee Freas]

I don't know if it's possible or not but could I place a made up neighbourhood in a city say New York? Or in any city? Can I change some street names here and there and place shops anywhere I want or does it have to be exactly like how it is on the map? Would people get offended if I didn't get it right? I've only been to NYC once on vacation so I can't really say that I know it very well.

Your last sentence makes me worry just a bit though. This technique works best when you do know the city fairly well. You'll be more successful if you can say where your new part fits in, and if you get the rest of the city right, it will help the reader suspend disbelief.

I've built subway systems and back alleys into cities where they don't exist, but knowing that there's a particular corner eatery on D Street, and bringing that in, will have even native locals thinking, "Is there an alley back there?"

I recommend getting a physical street map (from the time period of your piece), and referring to Google Street View often. Search for things that fit the detail you are looking for, and more importantly, make sure that you don't contradict something important unintentionally. Don't build your neighborhood on top of Wall Street, unless you really mean to.

If this change is a part of the story or plot, then you need to treat it the way historical fiction treats changes to history: bathe everything that you didn't change in as much verisimilitude as you can. Pick a specific district of New York to replace. Then decide how this new one will be different form the old one, and how its neighboring areas will be affected. What class stratification is this district? What are the crime levels? What are the demographics? What is its history, and how did that influence the history of other parts of the city? And so forth.

If however you simply want to set your work in "New York" without doing research on what that actually means... well, you still can do this. And a lot of people may not notice or care. You can build a fictional neighborhood of the city with whatever background you want.

People probably won't get bent out of shape if you get street names wrong or make up buildings or whatever. But if you are trying to write a work about "generic big city" and name it "New York", it will impact the verisimilitude of your story to some.

At the very least, you should make it clear to the reader that your insertion of this location is not a mistake on your part. The best way to do that is by putting in real details of New York city. If the surrounding area is legitimate, then it's clear that the different areas are a deliberate choice rather than something you just did.

If it's a "magic" hidden neighbourhood (like, let's say, Harry Potter's Diagon Alley) or something like that, you have total freedom to do what you want with it. If it's not, I suggest you to create a suburb (or a suburban town, they can be relatively big too) instead of a neighbourhood, 'burbs are in the outskirts and more or less far from downtown, so more creative freedom for you. If the real city is by the sea or a big lake/river, creating a small peninsula (or even an island, linked to mainland by a bridge) not far from the city core wouldn't be a bad idea IMHO. Be vague with street names in any case. Then, just write down a disclaimer saying that the X hood/suburb is your personal creation and yadda yadda, so no one will complain.

Sylvetta Christmas was born and raised in Chicago. Extensive hands-on experience in film, television and live events has allowed her to work domestically and abroad. Beginning as an intern, she worked her way through the ranks of production assistant, coordinator, associate producer, manager, line-producer and now executive producer. She has led and managed commercials for international brands and production for some of the top-rated cable network programs on VH1, MTV, Oxygen, Bravo, Lifetime, CNBC, REVOLT, OWN and others. She also lends her broad range of skills to live events such as Complex Con, multinational advertising and public relations company, Havas and award-winning Kartemquin Films.

Dr. Amara Enyia is a strategist, public policy expert and social impact professional with expertise in city and state public policy as well as international affairs. She works with companies, nonprofit organizations and community development financial institutions as a consultant developing operational strategies to help organizations maximize impact. She writes extensively on issues of education, economic development, fiscal policy, equity in policy, and systems thinking.

She serves as a formal representative of the African Union in the Diaspora, representing the 6th Region of the African Union Commission. She also serves on the boards of the Chicago Community Loan Fund, Chicago Neighborhoods Initiative and the Global Strategists Association. She maintains proficiency in Igbo, Spanish, French and Portuguese, and was named a public policy global leadership fellow with the Global Strategists Association. Dr. Enyia serves as a regular commentator and contributor on policy and politics for various media outlets.

Along with the Hideout, Tim is a Chicago Public School (CPS) teacher and active member of the Chicago Teachers Union. Tim most recently taught social studies at the Cook County Jail Juvenile Temporary Detention Center. Since 1986, Tim has taught at various CPS schools, as well as working in communications for the school district. He spent seven years based in Washington, D.C., with the Obama administration, traveling the country for the U.S. Department of Education.

The pack comes with 66 hand crafted models, among which 5 procedural buildings making use of Geometry Nodes. They are heavily customizable to your preference, going from the Height, Width and Depth to the extra items like the rooftop air conditioners and awnings. Everything is dynamic, even the materials are fully procedural to allow you the highest customization possible.

The materials used for most of the models are 100% procedural, meaning you get all the freedom to customize them to your liking without losing detail, this is the reason the pack is really lightweight.

The free tour ends at San Antonio park and we drop you off at San Antonio metro station. Very convenient to continue your day in Comuna 13, to take the cable car or to grab a beer at the famous Saln Mlaga.

In terms of sights we cover the main spots of the city centre: Old Railroad Station, Alpujarra and the huge "Monumento a la raza", Square of lights, Vasquz and Carr buildings, Carabobo boulevard, National Palace, Veracruz church, Botero square, Berrio Park and San Antonio park.

In terms of content we cover the origins, tragedy and resurection of Medellin. All told in an entertained way by certified local guides who lived much of the recent history. We also cover the colombian culture and the current social status.

Longer answer: Our Free Walking Tour does include the topic of drugs, but we go far beyond the times of Pablo Escobar, as we explore Medelln from its foundation up to the current days. Although we mention him it can definitely NOT be considered a Pablo Escobar tour.

Walking into the 2023 festival, we all had to go through metal detectors. Mark Trammell, one of the security managers at the gate I entered over the weekend, kept me abreast of various issues. Someone had been pick-pocketing cell phones. Others tried to get in with fake badges.

By 4 p.m. on Sunday, no one had tried to enter Music Midtown with a gun or weapon. If someone had tried to enter Music Midtown with a gun, security folks would have sent them to the 12th Street gate, where the weapon would have been locked up until the owner exited the festival.

Then there was the issue of mud, caused by several downpours with thousands of people stomping all over the grass in Piedmont Park. Mark Banta, president of the Piedmont Park Conservancy, spent time over the weekend personally assessing the situation.

Maria Saporta, executive editor, is a longtime Atlanta business, civic and urban affairs journalist with a deep knowledge of our city, our region and state. From 2008 to 2020, she wrote weekly columns...More by Maria Saporta

I have made a NYC, Chicago, Hong Kong, LA and currently working on a London UK recreation. I have also made cities that aren't actual recreations but I use landmarks from 1 or 2 cities only to come up with a familiar look. I have done this with Shanghai, Singapore, Melbourne and a Taipei/Tokyo mash up. I think my next city will be Denver, as thee 3 or 4 largest downtown skyscrapers are on the Exchange as well as the really cool Denver Art Museum. Shenzhen also on the list, with a few cool civic buildings to go along with skyscrapers.

Sometimes I start out with a plan like making a San Francisco look alike.. Or other times I'll have a purely fictional city and will finish it off by placing landmarks from one specific city to complete the look.

As for the real-city inspiration, i usually mix two or more styles into one city. If you watched the movie "Big Hero 6", you'll have a perfect example of this, as the city is an awesome mix between Tokyo and San Francisco. Another thing i do is to give the city it's own history, like a post-apocalyptic survivor town that eventually became a city, but i think that's another topic.

Thanks @Cassalett IV for the reply. Yes in some of my cities I'll pick landmarks from 2 or 3 different cities to complete the look I want. For as huge as Tokyo seems.. it sure seems underrepresented in the BATing world. Not too many non-Maxis DC BATs either but you're right, with the 5 provided it's a nice start.

Do you use real world maps at full scale? There's plenty of those here and in SimCity 4 Devotion. In some cases, there are cities with grid street networks in the city center area and there's maps that are tilted to match the city's grid with the game's construction grid. The most popular such instance is that of New York.

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