Sydney is a jerk. Let's just get that out of the way. Look at Melbourne and Adelaide, based on a lovely grid pattern (don't even get me started on New York). These are planned cities, made for easy navigation. Turns are usually 90° to each other. This makes designing a structured run a reasonable affair. Note: all city images are approximately the same scale.
Then there's Sydney. Take a look: the streets have curves in strange places and cul-de-sacs. The streets are in no way an equal distance away from each other. There's peninsulas everywhere that stop a design in its tracks. The hills … far out the hills! Oh, and there's a very large harbour cutting the city in two. That's a thing.
There is a silver lining though! The fact that there's very limited structure means that more realistic and proportional curves can be made by following streets alone - IF the right location can be found. Location choice is critical. It's also what led me to try more three-dimensional designs.
For example, if I can't find an area with enough width for, say, an entire crocodile, then I'll make the crocodile turn towards the 'viewer' and foreshorten it (see below). Additionally, peninsulas and strangely-shaped roads can be shaped like legs, horns, fins and other distinctive body parts which are great starting points. Sydney lends itself to imagination and thinking outside the box, which is basically a staple for me.
Comments