The first two services unlockedinCities: Skylinesare power and water. Both services are essential for almost every building in the game to operate, including all the zone buildings that pay taxes and provide most of the player’s income.
That’s why it’s important for players to know exactly how the water and sewage systems work inCities: Skylines. Not only do players have to keep on top of the city’s needs, they also have to keep spending low so the city’s budget stays positive. That’s why this guide will provide players with a few important tips and details that they can use to keep the water flowing and the sewage from backing up.
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Water and Sewage Use Different Buildings
The first thing to note is that water and sewage pipes are always built together, but players will need two separate structures to deal with intake and output. Water pumping stations and water towers draw water out of rivers and wells while water drain pipes and water treatment plants dump sewage out of the pipe network.
Sewer water is always polluted, even after players upgrade to the treatment plants, so always place the output buildings downstream from the pumps and verify the land underneath water towers isn’t polluted.If citizens drink polluted water, they’ll get sick and either die or move out.
Water Pipes Have Their Own Layer
In a real city, citizens and construction workers have to be careful where they dig because water and sewage pipes are just beneath the surface and cutting into them can cause some serious problems. Fortunately, players inCities: Skylinesdon’t have to worry about this because water pipes exist on their own layer and will never intersect withbuildings, roads, tunnels, or other construction work.
Another nice thing about the in-game water pipes is that there are no different widths or volumes. As long as a building is covered by the blue radius of a water pipe, and as long as the pipe is connected to both an intake and an outlet, that building will have no problems with water or sewage.Players can use modsto add new water buildings, but the way the water pipes work is always the same.
Use the Budget to Save Money
When players first start building a city, one pump and one drain have more than enough capacity to serve every building. This means players can lower the water budget to save money without causing any harm to citizens. To see this page, players should select the “economy” button on the bottom-right of the interface and switch to the budget tab. The sliders on this page let players adjust the budget to between 50 percent and 150 percent.
The best place for the water budget to be is 100 percent, since reducing any budget line to 50 percent will reduce the service to 25 percent capacity, and raising it to 150 will only get players a 125 percent boost. However, players can’t control how much water a single pump or drain can handle, and so reducing the budget isan important way to make moneyin the early game. Just remember to check the water info view regularly and make sure both “Water Availability” and “Sewage Treatment” are in the green. If they get close to the yellow zone, boost the budget if it’s not at 100 or add more pipes and drains if it is.
Cities: Skylinesis available now on PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One, and it’s coming out on PS5 and Xbox Series X/S on February 15.
