Cities: Skylines II Beginner's Guide: First Neighbourhood, Water, Power and Budget

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1. Choose the map wisely For a first city pick a map with plenty of flat land, some water and a ready highway connection. Hills and narrow valleys make road-building harder; a simple map is easier to learn on.
2. Run a main road from the highway Draw a main road into your city from the highway connection. This will be your city's spine, so use collector roads rather than connecting lots of small streets directly to it.
3. Build while paused Pause with Space and lay out your first infrastructure. The official wiki's advice cuts both ways: while paused, upkeep isn't charged, but citizens don't move in or pay taxes either, so don't overbuild and drain your funds.
4. A small grid and zones Build a tidy grid of a few blocks next to the main road. Zone low-density residential with a small commercial strip next to it. Place industry a bit away from homes, near the highway, with wind and pollution in mind.
5. Place water and sewage correctly Build a water pumping station for fresh water and a Sewage Outlet for wastewater. The pump must be upstream and the outlet downstream with a good distance between them, or dirty water flows back into the city. If you use groundwater, pick an unpolluted area.
6. Connect electricity Early on, a non-polluting source such as a wind turbine or the map's outside power lines works well. Water pipes and electric cables come built into roads, so service buildings only need a road connection; plants producing high voltage need a transformer station to supply buildings.
7. Watch demand, speed up Once infrastructure is ready, unpause and watch the demand bars. Zone a little more of whatever type shows demand. If everything is running, speed up with 2 or 3.
8. Unlock services at the first milestone The first milestone (Tiny Village) unlocks taxation, the city budget, map tiles, healthcare and garbage management. Build garbage and healthcare early, or happiness drops.
9. Spend Development Points with a plan Development Points from each milestone unlock new buildings in service trees. Rather than spreading them, spend them on the branch that solves your city's real problem: water if water is short, transport if traffic is bad.

• Use info viewsInfo views for water, electricity, pollution, traffic and more show problems with colour coding. Check the relevant view before citizens start complaining.
• Mind service coverageService vehicles can reach anywhere on the road network, but coverage matters for building levels and wellbeing. When placing a service building, the roads that turn green show its coverage.
• Keep intersections sparseConnecting streets to a main road every few metres locks up traffic. The official wiki also warns against wide roads that try to be both highway and street; build a hierarchy: highway, arterial, collector, local street.
• Separate trucks from commutersWhen industrial trucks and commuters share the same roads, congestion grows fast. Give industry its own access from the highway; later the Heavy Traffic Ban policy helps too.
• Keep pollution away from homesIndustry, landfills and some power plants create air, ground or noise pollution. Place them away from homes, ideally downwind. Groundwater is affected by ground pollution.
• Adjust taxes graduallyTaxes are set separately per zone type. Lower taxes help buildings level up and support demand; higher taxes bring more money. Change rates a few points at a time and watch the effect on demand.
• Tune service budgets to needRaising a service's budget increases its capacity (vehicles, student places, pump and plant output), lowering it reduces capacity. Trimming a service with a big surplus saves money.
• Start public transport earlyBus lines are cheap and effective; keep lines simple. Public transport reduces traffic and stops add to nearby wellbeing.
• Use loans carefullyThe loan limit rises with milestones and interest is added to monthly expenses. Borrow for infrastructure that will pay off, not to cover day-to-day deficits.
• Save oftenQuicksave with F5. A save before a big road change or demolition rescues you from an unexpected traffic collapse.

• Placing the water pump downstream of the sewage outlet: the city drinks polluted water, illness and move-outs follow.
• Building everything at once while paused: upkeep drains the treasury before income starts.
• Connecting many intersections to the main road: the city's spine clogs and service vehicles can't reach their targets.
• Putting industry right next to homes: pollution and noise cut happiness and heavy vehicles fill the streets.
• Zoning without checking demand: zones with no demand stay empty while shortages grow elsewhere.

This guide was written for version: This guide reflects the game during the 1.6 patch series as of September 2026. Controls are default PC bindings and can be changed in the Options menu.

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