Recommend City Pollution Managers

[IronMan]

Many people think the current process of using workers to deal with pollution, is not realistic. Instead of creating and moving workers to polluted squares, I suggest the following:

Create a new city specialist, in addition to the 3 already available, making 4 total:

Tax Collector
Entertainer
Scientist
Pollution Manager ****New proposal

The new pollution manager specialist will cost the city money for the cleanup operations that would otherwise have been used for other priorities, like production.

This approach will:

1. Create an ever increasing production impact as pollution increases in one or more affected cities. (If no action is taken, the pollution will dramatically lower city production, which demands player intervention to solve the problem)

2. Require more pollution managers to support the city cleanup operations as the "amount" of city pollution increases.

3. Eliminate Worker relocation to polluted squares.


I think the proposed pollution manager is a more realistic way to deal with pollution in every city and should be incorporated into Civilization 4.


Anyone agree or disagree?


IronMan

[Trifna]

You forgot to add bananas as a poll option. What would such a manager manage to be called manager, decide which tile to wash and which to not wash?

If it's just as entertainers and all that, then I don't think that "managing pollution" is as general as an economy more oriented towards services/research which corresponds to entertainers and researchers. I hardly hear about economies oriented towards cleaning

[IronMan]

Are you saying that in the city in which you live, no money is spent to dispose of trash, no recycling programs exist and water is not treated to filter out contaminates? What about the cost for street sweepers and hazardous waste programs? Indeed, every city must provide expenditures to deal with pollution.

What you don't see is workers from California going out to New York to clean up pollution. Each city hires their own specialists from the local community to deal with specific pollution problems.

In this light, pollution managers or specialists make sense for Civilization 4.


Ironman

[Trifna]

No, I am saying that these little faces representing scientists and entertainers are not there to represent spending on a job or another but the orientation of an economy. R&D economy, service economy.

[IronMan]

Scientists support research, Entertainers affect the population's moral and Tax Collector's support the empire's budget. All 3 take away from production of units and wonders to help the player increase funding in their respective areas. Adding a 4th specialist, the Pollution Manager, would also take funds away from city production to help the player deal with the problem of pollution.

This proposal eliminates the unrealistic movement of workers from California to clean up pollution in New York and forces New York to pay for their own cleanup. As a result, the proposal frees up workers to concentrate on building other important empire projects, like roads, railroads, etc.


Ironman

[Optimizer]

Indeed there are many people who work with waste disposal and environmental protection today, at least in industrialized countries.


One major problem with Civ is that most citizens have to work as farmers, still in the industrial and information eras.

In the real world, the efficiency of farming has improved so that fewer people could work the same land, and most of the workforce was available as workforce to the industry. This might be the greatest difference between daily life today and 200 years ago, but it is not a feature in the Civ games.

[IronMan]

Originally posted by Optimizer
One major problem with Civ is that most citizens have to work as farmers, still in the industrial and information eras.

In the real world, the efficiency of farming has improved so that fewer people could work the same land, and most of the workforce was available as workforce to the industry. This might be the greatest difference between daily life today and 200 years ago, but it is not a feature in the Civ games.

The issue is not about "farming", but rather "pollution".

The proposal can improve the way Civ 4 deals with pollution, which starts to increase dramatically during the industrial age. As an empire approaches Modern times, more city improvements, especially in DYP, greatly reduce the effects of pollution. Advanced cities, that have these improvements, deal with pollution very efficiently and rarely see any more problems with pollution.

Bottom line is: I think most people get tired of the ritual of sending workers clear accross an empire to clean up pollution. Let the City deal with pollution, with the proposed new specialist, until such a time when efficient city advancements can take over the task.


Ironman

[Naokaukodem]

Who cares really about pollution. If you have to clean it, just bring a worker.
If a Bomber bombards your railroads, bring a worker.

In addition Pollution does not have a major role in Civ3 imo.

You can also vote for a Public Work as in CTP as it seems.

[IronMan]

Originally posted by Naokaukodem
Who cares really about pollution. If you have to clean it, just bring a worker.

If you are in the industrial age, pollution is a factor and is caused by the following:

City Population and combined pollution points
Airport + 1
Coal Plant + 2
Factories + 2
Iron Works + 4
Manufacturing Plant + 2
Offshore Platform + 2
Research Lab + 1

How you clean up the pollution is the issue here, especially on a huge game map.

1. Do you want to pull multiple workers off of other projects from one end of your empire and have to move them to the other end of the empire to clean up a polluted square?

or

2. Do you want to convert one or more "production" workers into pollution specialists to "directly" clean up pollution within the affected city (just like creating entertainers to stop unrest)?

Which is easier to you?
Which choice is more realistic?


Ironman

[Naokaukodem]

Don't ask me to choice between one thing or the other. There are workers in the game, but once again, you can play at CTP for Public Work which is pretty what you might look for. But don't ask ME more, as i didn't play to it.

[Flinx]

How about building a blue box program, a toxic household waste depot, and an energy efficency information campaign?

[IronMan]

Originally posted by Flinx
How about building a blue box program, a toxic household waste depot, and an energy efficency information campaign?

How about some constructive ideas concerning the proposal?

Workers vs Pollution Specialists....


Ironman

[Flinx]

Originally posted by IronMan
How about some constructive ideas concerning the proposal?
Workers vs Pollution Specialists....
Ironman

It was a constructive proposal

In CTP pollution is reduced by buildings: "Recycling Plant" and "Public Transportation" in the modern era and "Matter Decompiler" and "Eco-Transit" in the future. Civ does not have a future era so I came up with 3 modern era examples.

[IronMan]

Originally posted by Flinx
It was a constructive proposal

"Recycling Plant", "Public Transportation", "Matter Decompiler" and "Eco-Transit" are all NEW proposals. You might define them as city improvements, which reduce pollution in a given city by a certain factor. CIV 3 already has various city improvements that reduce pollution. A few more may not be a bad idea.

However, I believe the current proposal is asking how a city can reduce pollution, until such a time a city improvement can be made. Currently, Civ 3 uses workers to clean up polluted squares. The proposal suggests CIV 4 convert one or more "production" workers into pollution specialists to "directly" clean up pollution within the affected city. Pollution would accumulate in the city and not on the surrounding squares. It may take several pollution specialists to hold pollution in check, until such a time as a city improvement can be bought or produced. Then the pollution specialists can be converted back into production workers to maximize city production.

Ironman

[Flinx]

Current System:
Remove a citizen from the general population by building a Worker unit and use this unit to clean up pollution.

Proposed System:
Remove a citizen from the general population by conversion to a specialist Pollution Manager whose purpose is to clean up pollution.

This is somehow different?