Simpler intersections score more for every car.
How to play City Planner
City Planner is a free browser game about one busy corner. Your term in office is eight waves of traffic, and they are the same eight every time: a quiet Sunday morning, school drop-off, a Main Street rush, delivery day, a stadium letting out, a rainy rush hour, a lunch crowd that all turns left, and Friday at five. Before each wave you read the forecast and choose the intersection that will carry it. Nothing to install, and it works with a mouse, a trackpad or a finger.
Five intersections, simplest first
| Intersection | Per car |
|---|---|
| 2-way stop. Stop signs on the cross street only. Main Street never stops. | 10 + 10 |
| 4-way stop. Everyone stops and takes turns. | 10 + 8 |
| Roundabout. Yield, then circle. Nobody waits for a light. | 10 + 6 |
| Traffic lights. Timed lights and a left-turn lane on every street. | 10 + 4 |
| Smart lights. Sensors pick the green, with left and right turn lanes. | 10 + 2 |
Every car that makes it through the intersection is worth 10 points plus the intersection's adder, so a car through a 2-way stop is worth twice a car through smart lights. The catch is the goal. Each wave names how many of its cars must get through, and a simple intersection may not be able to carry a heavy wave. Meet the goal and the council adds 200 points. Miss it and a complaint is filed; three complaints and your term is over.
Beat the clock
How fast the road clears counts as much as how many cars make it. When the last car of a wave arrives, a 60-second clock starts. The wave ends the moment the road is clear, and every second still on the clock is worth 10 points. An intersection that moves the same cars in half the time can beat a simpler one that leaves them sitting in line. If the clock runs out, the cars still waiting never score.
Wave a driver through
While a wave runs, click any car to wave its driver through. The driver goes at once, whatever it was waiting for: a stop sign, a red light, a gap in the roundabout. That is how a simple intersection can beat its limits and the clock, and it is also how wrecks happen, because nobody else on the road was told. Every wreck costs 100 points and blocks the road until the cars limp off. The driver you click is the one that goes: wave out a car that is stuck behind another and it drives straight into it.
Scoring
| What happened | Points |
|---|---|
| A car gets through | 10 + the intersection's adder |
| Each second left on the clock when the road is clear | +10 |
| The wave's goal is met | +200 |
| A wreck | −100 |
| The goal is missed | A complaint |
| Three complaints | Term over |
After each wave the city engineer's report shows what every intersection would have scored on that same traffic with nobody waved through, and how much time each had to spare, so you can see whether your pick was the best one. Your best term saves on this device, and the top terms go on a public board by first name.
The same corner, two more ways
The drivers here are the ones from the Traffic Playground, where you can set the traffic yourself and read what every driver is thinking, and from Traffic Cop, where you ticket the ones who break the rules. Each driver has its own attention, judgment and patience, so the same intersection never handles two waves quite the same way.