[REWORK] AZ, CA, and NV public research and rework suggestions.

[Laqueesha]

Minor gripe, but the CA license plate needs to be updated, like NV's recently was. The new CA plate, (not so really all that new anymore) was introduced in 2011 and has the California DMV's web address on the bottom. The one in the game at the moment is the old 1994 to 2010 plate that lacks the website URL. For reference, here's a pic of of the current (new) one, with the web address emblazoned on the bottom.

Also, I'd like to see unique emergency peds for each state, particularly policemen. ETS2 has unique policeman and fireman peds for each country, ATS should do the same. At the moment we got a generic policeman in grey uniform and a California Highway Patrol officer in tan uniform, though the latter spawns in all states.

[Vinnie Terranova]

Some time ago SCS posted a teaser and a blog(?) about the San Francisco revamp. Well, at least I think they did, but I can't find that teaser and blog anymore.

Anyway, we now know that SCS will overhaul the basemap. Which is really, really good news.

Now, here's the thing: I have a lot of wishes regarding the overhaul of the big cities, like San Francisco, Los Angeles, etc. I also had some wishes about Las Vegas. Learning from the Las Vegas revamp I guess I'll leave it to SCS how they will overhaul the cities. I know for sure that whatever they do, it will be better than what we now have.

I don't know what SCS is gonna do regarding downtown areas. I think it's kinda difficult to create representative downtown areas because of the scale, and maybe some other limitations.

If SCS plans to do some downtown areas they could use Google Street View. But I came across some really nice Driving Downtown YouTube videos of a guy called J Utah. Maybe SCS can use those videos to get some more information about the big cities, as Street View images are static. As videos are dynamic, one can get information about things like: traffic patterns, traffic lights, AI behaviour, pedestrians, road constructions, etc.

Here is an example of a Driving Downtown video of San Francisco.

[flight50]

@Vinnie Terranova check the base map rebuild in the General Discussion thread. Supersobes just posted it.

[Vinnie Terranova]

Oh, okay, I clearly misinterpreted that tweet... Thanks @flight50 for the link.

But if that tweet was not about a revamp of San Francisco, then what was the message SCS tried to give us with that tweet? In july 2020 we got the ATS 1.38 update including the Las Vegas revamp. In the meantime we were all talking about another needed revamp: Los Angeles. But we were also talking about a revamp of the Bay Area of San Francisco / Oakland. So when SCS posted that tweet, the conclusion was quite simple and obvious: revamp of San Francisco.

But as it seems now, there will be no revamp of San Francisco for a long time? That's quite a disappointment... I know that SCS is working on northern California, and I for a long time thought that San Francisco would get an overhaul when Central California is getting reworked. But if SCS is not doing cities, what kind of overhaul can we expect? Is it just the roads/interchanges/ramps that get a rework? Well, it's nice that the basemap roads will be in par with the newest DLCs. But it's also nice that the basemap cities will be in par with the newest DLCs...

This probably also means that we'll have to wait for a very, very long time before Los Angeles gets a rework?

And last, but not least: I now have the feeling that SCS has created false expectations with that San Francisco tweet. If the message of that tweet was not meant to be about a revamp of San Francisco, then what is that message? About the new lighting? I don't think so, because the quality of the video in that tweet was really bad. Was it about the base map rebuild? I don't think so, because it is northern California that gets a rebuild, and San Francisco is in Central California. So what was the message of that tweet? I like teasers, but I don't like getting false expectations.

[flight50]

That tweet was nothing more than a "where is this" tweet. We the community took it to different measures. SCS never said anything. As far as cities, they didn't say they won't do them, Jakub said they are avoiding them for right now. More than likely, they don't have the capacity or they don't have the city builders available because of other projects. So if California.........or the entire base map for that matter is getting reskinned, the cities will be a part of that. I don't know what they did in Germany, but I'd imagine the reskin is worth it.

[bobgrey1997]

Where is this tweet? I've never heard anything of it, and I never pay attention to social media sites.

[parasaurolophus67]

https://twitter.com/SCSsoftware/status/ ... 9370305536 this one

[EurocopterX3]

So, with a California Rework officially announced, I believe it's about time to revive this thread so that the wonderful developers at SCS can be able to get as much information as possible to correct some of the flaws that the older portions of the map have.

As it has recently come to my attention, when SCS eventually reaches the Bay Area during this rework, the toll system needs to be changed for bridges. As of mid-2020, the seven Bay Area state-owned bridges have switched over to purely electronic tolls and no longer accept cash. This change does not appear to be temporary and was actually enacted earlier due to the COVID-19 Pandemic. It seems that the Golden Gate Bridge has transferred to only using electronic tolls as well. (https://mtc.ca.gov/whats-happening/news ... ea-bridges & https://511.org/driving/bridges for more detailed information about it.)

Provided that the cities of California also receive reworks, I stress that Redding needs to be rebuilt. As someone who is familiar with the area, I can outright confirm that a lot of the area feels off to me and doesn't really resemble the city. It is also missing Redding's most iconic landmark, the Sundial Bridge. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sundial_B ... Turtle_Bay) As a heads-up, I want to mention that the downtown region has changed quite a bit within the last year and thus, Google Maps may be inaccurate when it comes to this side of Redding. When it comes to industry, the nearby city of Anderson does have a lumber mill. This could allow for the Deepgrove timber harvest site (which was added in 1.35) to link up with either a sawmill, depot or both and thus serve some sort of purpose. However, I do believe that the Gallon Oil refinery could be removed because to my knowledge, there aren't any petroleum refineries in this region of Northern California. Additionally, Redding does host both Coca-Cola and Pepsi distribution centers, so if absolutely considered, USBB could become a company within Redding.

[Vinnie Terranova]

There is another thread about the basemap rework.

[EurocopterX3]

I was under the impression that the staff would likely be looking through the ones in public research more often than the ones in say, general discussion.