MOD: Large model downtown city project

[alienwar9]

Hi,

This is one of my first projects, one of hopefully many. If you’ve read my “Introduction” post, then you can understand what exactly I am trying to do.

Basically, this is a large scale city MOC that I want to build from mostly donations by communities, and that will eventually all go towards charity.

I am currently in the process of pinning down the exact way that the donations and charity will work, and if anyone can help me, or if you just want to know how it might work, please look into my “donations” post***.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Update

This has now changed to a TEAM build. I am looking for anybody with experience willing to lead the project, and anybody willing to help build. You must live somewhere near Chicago to be able to meet and help build. This is only to see if there are any people willing, and not an agreement or anything like that. For more information, see the update at the bottom of my main post.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

So onto the meat!

What is it exactly?

It’s an 11 foot x 13 foot mini-fig scale Lego downtown city, complete with building interiors, streets, 6x6 block area, and filled with features.

There is also a second “phase” (see original post for more details. see below for this specific project.) where the city is under attack by aliens (including alien monsters), and the military and a secret underground force are trying to stop them.

(The second phase is optional, and is yet to be decided if it will be included).

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

How did this start out?

I started out just wanting to build a city that was based somewhat on the city of Chicago. I wanted skyscrapers, along with smaller corner café type buildings, and have a bunch of different areas. It went through many planning phases with different sizes and I finally came to a set layout with everything I wanted to put in it. The entire piece is 11 feet by 13 feet and the tallest building is 6 feet tall. It all sits on a painful number of baseplates.

There are about 52 buildings within a 6 x 6 block area. There is a highway of sorts, a river, a park, and a “lakefront”.

There is an industrial district, a market district, and a business district.

There are 5 towers, the largest of which has 19 floors.

Here are a couple more angles of the city.

You can see the lakefront here, along with the river mouth, the skyline, and the industrial docks.

This would be the main downtown area. It includes the two corner shaped buildings, and possibly another bridge across the river.

A lakefront “highway” runs along the front of the city, and through the industrial district.

You can see the light poles all along the way, as well as the bridge, skyway, and angled section.

This was one of the hardest parts for me to do, as I am using the tiling method for roads, and so the roads are very thin and don’t have many options when it comes to angles. Through the pain of fiddling with the LDD program’s rotation tool, I got the road to sit on a separate baseplate system on-top of the main baseplates, and connect the walls to either end. The road and central column aren’t actually connected to anything, and are just held in place by the outside barriers. Unfortunately, this method also means that I was left with ugly bumps at the cross points.

Here you can see the hotel entrance. I know, the exit isn’t very logical, and I forgot to cut out a piece of the central area for them to get to the opposite side of the highway. This is one area where I was going to ask for help on, as I had no ideas on how to create the curved driveway. You can also see the building footprint in the top right corner. That is the museum, and it has a courtyard in the back there (second picture).

Here you can see the industrial district docks. There are 3 buildings here (one small one in the top right under the bridge). The docks would extend out from this area. You can also see the “skyway”, though it is not finished as I was limited to LDD pieces. The basic points of support would be roughly the same size and location though.

Here you can see the “shops” area, where all the high class stores, apartments, restaurants, and businesses are located. The street is split, with a decorative center (with trees and stuff).

This continues through to the lower section, with a market area, sized with corner café buildings. The right side is comprised of corner café buildings, while the left has slightly larger buildings (because of the slanted road. I will get to that).

Here you can notice part of the slanted road, the stairs, and to the right, a smaller side street going through a building tunnel.

This is one of the main streets, and is slanted at 2 points. Basically, the road is built on a baseplate and the hangover end is attached to a hinge allowing it to rest at an angle.

The river divides the downtown area in half. Here you can see the highway bridge with the sidewalks along the way. These sidewalks would be extra wide and include trees, decorations, or lampposts.

At the other end of the river is the tunnel building. It is a 5 story building, with a 2 story bridge over the river. At the left is the connecting building, with its own smaller “bridge”.

Inside the bridge are glass floors that allow people to view the river below. From the bottom, more windows sit to let viewers take a look at passing boats. This was an extremely fun part to build.

The river curves along the way, cutting from one city block lane into another, and causing the 2 corner shaped buildings to exist. Another bridge could be placed at the bottom end.

At the “curving point”, there are a few more details. First, there is the angled wall (I really built it a stupid way. I was up to the morning working on it so my mind was acting up). Then there is a “pad” area. This could serve one of two purposes.

It could be just a regular platform; letting underground facilities or docks use it. Or, go along with the “second phase” and become a secret extending “hover launch pad”. The hydraulics were placed underneath to allow the pad to raise up and down; and a vertical take of vehicle would come out the door from the underground base.

Here you can see a dock area that leads up to the main roads. Just a little detail I wanted to add.

The city is divided into 2 sections, and upper area, and a lower area; where the lower area is actually about 13 bricks lower than the rest of the city.

The roads are in a grid form, with the two areas connected by the slanted road.

Most roads are 3 lanes wide, and 1 way. I didn’t want the roads to simply be 2-way single lane roads like most baseplate roads are. This is 24 studs wide, with the middle lane being wider than the outside two. I have yet to figure out if all roads will be the same, of if I can get some roads to be both way, 1 lane smaller, etc.

I want to fully fill each building and the streets with activity, so there are a lot of interior pieces to be used. This is an example of a rough estimate of one of the taller skyscrapers (second tallest). As you can see in the earlier example, each floor is created for a different purpose: apartments/condos, stores, offices/businesses, penthouses/luxury condos, sky decks, and maintenance floors. Each set of floors has a different height (and brick height number). There are center columns within the buildings where the stairs, elevators, and facilities are located. The elevator area has enough room for 2 elevators, and extra space for equipment, structuring, and inner workings.

The base of the building has two main entrances on either side, plus an extra space for a store or restaurant in the front. The rear has either a security entrance, or service entrance (depending on what building it is).

The lobby includes the central structure, the store, bathrooms, security/service room, and lobby entrance areas. The two elevator entrances and stair entrance can be seen here (I still have to figure out a door system for the elevators). The front store (4th picture) has 2 levels: the counter, and the second level area for eating or keeping store items. (Yes, a fig won’t hit their head walking up those stairs…I checked).

I also quickly came up with a little elevator system with the LDD pieces. I’m sure with a little time a better system could be made, but I think it looks pretty cool. The piece would sit at the top of the building, with the round white knob on the outside (blending in). A lever could be pulled out of the round knob, and the whole unit pushed in to disengage the lock. The string would run around the two wheels and down the center, and pull the elevators up and down with the spin of the knob. The two pipes would run alongside the elevators (for looks).

I also built a “mock” building to test out an idea I had. This would be building number 5. I wanted to create a round entrance to a building, and not just a 45 degree face. I already have (and found) better ideas for implementing a round entrance, but this is what I came up with. It is supposed to be a high end retail store, with 3 tall floors, and an open entrance. The side walls are a bit odd, and I couldn’t find a right color for the pieces next to the side entrances (gold and grey, ick).

The tile-work is also a bit weird, but once again, this was 4 in the morning after 16 hours of working on the layout, so I was a little out of it.

Here you can see the oddly placed windows. Those would go over the entrance door, much like the CC fire station window.

Here is the second floor. You can see the open ceiling entrance, with the glass railings. And once again the weird tile work. An odd thing happened with this though. I was building the floor, when I noticed that I had built a white cross in tiles. I had no idea how that happened, but it’s just something that I noticed afterward.

Here in the final picture you can see the height that the building would come to, and try to imagine what it would look like (sorry for making you imagine. I didn’t have time to finish it).

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The idea for buildings was so far:

1: skyscraper

2: federal/government building

3: bank

4: parking

5: high end store (above)

6: shopping mall (with Lego store )

7: skyscraper

8: hotel

9: TV/radio building

10: library

11: high end condos

12: mixed

13: skyscraper

14: skyscraper

15: modern art styled business building

16: theatre

17: restaurant/club

18: museum

19-21: mixed

22-24: mixed

25: hotel

26: pub/bar, houses/apartments/motel, stores

27-29: stores and houses

30-33: restaurants/stores

34-36: stores/houses

37-41: mixed

42: Corner Café

43-45: houses

46: Warehouse (secret operations)

47: electrical stations

48: mill/factory

49-51: shipping docks

Some other ideas for what would be in the buildings are:

Hospital

Police station

Electronics store

Clothing stores

Pizza place

Nightclubs

City hall

Movie rental

Pharmacy

Post office

Gun store

Sports store

Business headquarters

I had a few extra plans like for a street underneath the higher level (like wacker drive), that would go under the bridge (making it a double deck bridge). I couldn’t find a good place for it yet though. Another thing I was thinking about was either a subway system, a rail system above the streets, or even a tram/trolley system (or a mixture of them). Finally, with the taller buildings, I wanted to see if I could build them so that they could open like a book, instead of having to take each floor off.

One thing I felt wouldn’t be realistic or feasible within the size and style of the city was any form of trains. I felt it would just take up too much space, though any suggestions or ideas that could work them in would be appreciated.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Second Phase

The second phase of this one is under consideration. I really badly want to do it, but I also realize that along with donation issues, it increases the piece and price count from an already high amount. Basically it would be an alien invasion scene. This would include all kinds of creatures that the aliens have, including a 3 foot tall monster, and possibly some smaller space ships. The monster would be about 36 inches tall and be holding onto the tallest building while walking around. Multiple different kinds of creatures would exist all over, along with piece built aliens. There would be holes and fires in buildings, people running everywhere, and a fully deployed military trying to fight off the aliens. This would include some tanks, apcs, humvees, a couple fighter jets, helicopters, and par-trooping figs from a plane. Also, since I had so many ideas for it, I wanted to build a secret military unit hidden inside the city, with the semi-futuristic vehicles and equipment that might come with that (including mechs of course). That would include the warehouse staging/vehicle construction base, the river pad, and an elevator system that would come out of an intersection. This would include advanced hover/heli vehicles, armored troop carriers, assault bikes, a hover tank, a few heavy duty mechs, and armed weapon suits. I was also thinking of a small network of underground bases. For the damaged parts of the city, I would have “plates” or removable and swappable parts like wall sections, trees, streets, etc that could be changed with the normal city so that you could turn the city quickly from model city to attacked city.

But like I said, this one is under consideration for obvious reasons. It would definitely shift potential auctioneers also. It is something I really would love doing, and would definitely make this model unique (an in my eyes awesome), not to mention give the whole thing a scenic and movie like feel.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Finally, here is the Lego Digital Designer file for the layout, for one of the skyscrapers, and the high end store(includes elevator mechanism).

WARNING: The layout is huge, so only open it if you know your computer can handle it. It slows even my system down, and adding any larger piece (like a skyscraper) crashed it or crashed it when I saved.

Link to the brickshelf folder

Link to the hub post

Link to the donation discussion post

Link to the LDD issues post

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Where to next?

Well, other than the update (below), I am going to try and get the layout transferred to either MLCAD or SR3D builder and see if it can work there, as then I could sectionalize it, allowing me to actually work on it rather than having it freeze, crash, or not save. While I have issues with these other systems (it’s hard to get used to after LDD) I do need the extra pieces, colors, and ability for more complex piece connections. I’m then probably going to add in some of the street details, park, and extras. From there I’m going the “fill” in the buildings, putting up at least their outside walls to get a better sense of what everything will look like, along with picking the color schemes of the buildings.

Probably the last phase would be to add in the interior detail, but I’m probably going to wait on that one for the team (maybe just a few buildings).

And I’m probably at one point or another going to get distracted, start building some aliens, monsters, or forces, and end up doing a lot of work there (even though it might not be included).

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Update (cont)

Because of the group aspect, I am redesigning a lot of the layout, design, style, etc of the build. While many aspects will stay the same, building size, complexity, arrangement, will definitely change. I wanted to make the entire city more unique, diverse, and add depth and complexity to it. It needs to have more variety. Angled roads, different types of roads, different building sizes, a different lakefront with buildings on the other side of the highway and a beach, a bit more water in front, some surrounding roads possibly, larger city blocks with more buildings located in a single block rather than “1 building per block”, and maybe a more complex river are some of the changes I want to make.

Now is also a great time to give me ideas, as it will be a lot easier to implement them into the design rather than later.

Generally, I’m working more on the basic layout and what will be included in the city, so ideas pertaining to that would be the most helpful, but any other ideas are also more than welcome!

________________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

Thank you for taking some time to look at my project (and thank you especially if you had the courage and patience to read everything!).

Please remember to let me know if you are interested in helping build or lead this project, or if you know of anyone who would be willing to. More information about that, and the other projects I have planned, is in my other post here. Information and discussion about the donation system is posted here

I look forward to reading any responses and working on this project with all of you! Suggestions are more than welcome (they are suggested). This is more than a team build. It is a community build, and I want to let everyone have a part in this.

And if you liked this, look forward to more work on this and my other projects.

(Oh, and don’t worry. I will be working on this regardless of how the team and donation system work out. It will just take a LOT longer)

Ok then. I’m DONE! (my fingers hurt)

[prateek]

Oh wow! If you manage to build this, I will be blown away. It would no doubt be the best MOC on EB. BTW how in the world did you get LDD to manage that huge city!?! I have a small town on LDD consisting of 10 32x32x modulars and some vehicles and that makes it crash.

Anyways, these plans are awesome and good luck.

And you should resize the pics, because they freeze my browser for around 10 seconds.

[MacK]

Wow! That thing is huge, just one suggestion I have for you would be to scrap out the interiors, if your planning on just having this thing on display then there is no real need for interiors as no one will ever really see them. Plus that would also free up a huge amount of bricks and time .

Edited March 5, 2010 by MacK

[the_green_avenger]

I personnally really like all the individual ideas you have for this MOC, but if you wan't to make your life a helluva lot easier, you should only do specific buildings. That way when your going to sell it, You'll get a lot more $ per brick.

[Eilif]

You've got some pretty impressive desgins. As skeptical as I am of the charitable value of the project, I have to say that I really like many of the designs you have come up with, both the layout and some of the detail work such as the dock and commercial facades.

[alienwar9]

Oh wow! If you manage to build this, I will be blown away. It would no doubt be the best MOC on EB. BTW how in the world did you get LDD to manage that huge city!?! I have a small town on LDD consisting of 10 32x32x modulars and some vehicles and that makes it crash.

Anyways, these plans are awesome and good luck.

And you should resize the pics, because they freeze my browser for around 10 seconds.

Thanks! I do have a pretty powerful computer, but with the skyscrapers you see there, I had to go into compatibility mode to place them, and even then I can't save it, so I have to replace them every time I want to see. Also, I had to remove their interiors completely and all the glass to get it to work. I'm hoping MLCAD or SR3D will have more luck.

I'll see what I can do about the re-size. With the words and directional hints on the pics though, it might be illogical cause then you can't read the words. (at least that's how it looks for me. I'm running 1080p though).

Wow! That thing is huge, just one suggestion I have for you would be to scrap out the interiors, if your planning on just having this thing on display then there is no real need for interiors as no one will ever really see them. Plus that would also free up a huge amount of bricks and time .

True! However, I wanted it to be unique in a way. One of those, "every inch is awesome" things. So with the interiors, I was hoping to get some beautiful details in too. Of course, a good idea might be to only do the "outer" buildings, as they are the only ones in easy reach of a person. One idea I had in mind was actually having the buildings open on a power function (only the tall ones). But that's just an idea at this point.

I personnally really like all the individual ideas you have for this MOC, but if you wan't to make your life a helluva lot easier, you should only do specific buildings. That way when your going to sell it, You'll get a lot more $ per brick.

Oh, I never make my life easy. One of my firm beliefs is that anything worth doing isn't easy. I've always tried to go above and beyond. Make a short video? I make an hour long movie. 10-15 page paper? I do a 42 page (pictures included) study. Sure, this is probably a massive headache, but I'm really passionate about making it work (I've spent every free hour and some sleep working on this for the last month, and I expect that trend to continue).

And while I do believe that the chances of auctioning off smaller parts is a lot higher and I'd raise more $, there is a sort of "collective" effect when you group things together. I think that at the end, if someone is actually willing to go for it there would be a higher price to piece ratio. And in a raffle system, it would garner much more attention hopefully.

But it is definitely a lot to handle, and so that is why (thanks to the wise words of EB staff especially) it has become a team build.

And thank you for your comments! I'm especially glad you like the ideas!

You've got some pretty impressive desgins. As skeptical as I am of the charitable value of the project, I have to say that I really like many of the designs you have come up with, both the layout and some of the detail work such as the dock and commercial facades.

Thanks!!!! Yeah, the dock area is one of my favorite parts too. It came out much better than I expected (with the piece selection on LDD). I hope I can get everything in the right place to make you less skeptical. Work in progress it is!

[Jasper Joppe Geers]

Good luck i'd say! Can't wait to see the pics!

[Brick & Mortimer]

Wow, impressive!

I really hope this will be built!

It really captures the look of Chicago... the river, the lakefront, the highway,...

The bridge over the river mouth looks beter than the real one

The skyscraper next to the river mouth should be designed as the Lake Point Tower

[marto_66]

Dude, I will be really thankful if you send me all the lxf files of

WIP: Large model downtown city Part 1,2 and 3. And one more question: What kind of characteristics must my computer have, so that it wont crash, when I open it? My e-mail is marto_66@abv.bg

[igacreative]

This is very impressive. Planning is impeccable!

[emilstorm]

Wow, that's a lot of work. I admire your patience! I have tried LDD a few times, and all it does is make me want to break something. But this is quite spectacular, and really makes me want to play GTA for some reason;)

[LOTRfan]

Wow! From above it doesn't even look like LDD, I thought it was just a 3D plan!

[LEGO Guy Bri]

Dude, I will be really thankful if you send me all the lxf files

I wouldn't get your hopes up. This topic is 4 years old and he hasn't signed in in over a year