Contributor/author(s): Andrew Hayes

As I’ve looked around the forums, I’ve noticed a great deal of confusion concerning two very important concepts- demand and desirability. These two forces share equal importance in determining whether your city will grow, and neither is effective without the other.

Demand might be defined as the potential for a certain building to develop, and is determined by the status of a region. In a small town, for instance, there is very little likelihood that a 50 story high rise will develop. There would not be enough people to live in it, and even if there were, there would not be nearly enough jobs for them. Nor could the poor residents of a young town afford to live in a condominium. Rather, they would prefer a 2-bedroom house, or maybe an apartment. Therefore, in our hypothetical small town, we would say that demand for the high rise is low, while the demand for the house is high.

When you are trying to increase demand, the most useful tool is to imagine yourself in the position of the simdevelopers. The factors that determine demand are different for every zone type. Demand for Commercial services, for instance, is defined largely by the number of people living in the city or region, for the obvious reason that the more people there are in the area, the more customers there will be. Residential demand is driven not by population as much as the availability of jobs. Industries prefer less educated workers, while commercial offices prefer wealthy employees. I’ll be writing a more in depth article on demand for specific zone types at a later date.

Desirability also effects what buildings are constructed in your city, but is almost entirely unrelated to demand. If demand is the potential for growth, desirability is the actual probability of growth. As an example, your city may need high-wealth residential. However, if you zone high density residential across the street from a toxic waste dump, no one is going to build an expensive condominium in that lot. Why? Because it is not desirable.

In trying to predict desirability, it is useful to imagine yourself in the position of the Sims themselves. Desirability is local in nature, and is determined by the services and attributes available in a specific neighborhood. Residential desirability is, for instance, increases when quality education and healthcare are available nearby, and there are jobs and services within a short drive. It is hurt by the presence of undesirable buildings such as military bases or dirty industry. A map of desirability for each zone type is available under the Data Views pullout (the fourth button down in the Mayor Mode control panel)

When building cities, remember that demand and desirability are both unrelated and completely dependent on one another. No matter how desirable a neighborhood is, a building will not develop unless there is demand for it. Conversely, no matter how high demand may be, the right building will never develop in the wrong place

Happy mayoring!

See also
How To Get Wealthy Cities

Knowledge Tree

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