CDS Discussion

At the last meeting of the LUC, observing that the entire SW section of LA is empty (aside from parcels owned by me and one water parcel owned by Badger), I presented a proposal to redevelop this section in a more "organically evolved" style, with somewhat the approach that Stella Marina was redeveloped. Here is the proposal: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1nss ... sp=sharing

It met with generally positive feelings from the committee members, but concern was expressed that removing all this land from the market for the extended time needed to build a new section from scratch would be very detrimental to CDS finances. In addition, there is no guarantee that a new "style" will meet with greater success. These are very valid concerns. So I have come up with an addition to the proposal... in a sense, an extension of the proposal which explains how this redevelopment can happen over the course of a weekend, thus getting the area back on the market asap.

A very old creator, SIMAY Design, has created builds which are already used by several residents on LA. They are interesting, attractive, and correspond exactly with the covenant theme. This creator has offered several large collections of builds (and furnishings!) in this style. The basic theme is called by them "Old Italian Village". I propose to use these builds to quickly create a new village according to the blueprint shown in the above link.

For getting some idea of what this will look like, I offer several resources. First, visit the existing homes on LA which are from this creator. Tor has his Winery in the northeast section of the sim, across the road from my Chapel, and Lil has rezzed the Old Farmhouse on a parcel just to the west of my Chapel. Out in the area of the proposed redevelopment, I have set up another Country House and attached a Bar, also from SIMAY.

Next, here are some photos, 3 from the model at the creator's store, and one of my Bar and House in LA now: https://photos.app.goo.gl/8eDDCmjF4zB1Gyy29 Finally, you can visit the creator's store at: http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Optimal/66/91/24

and rez copies of the Old Italian Village and Old Italian Village 2. I have both of these products in my possession... ready to start if this proposal meets with community approval. I estimate it will take about a weekend to set up.

Sudane.........................

I really like this look. We already have Simay houses in Locus Amoenus and this continues that theme, making for good conformity within the sim. This gets my 'vote'!

Oh! I LOVE these ideas Sudane! Great photos and a wonderful inspiration! This design is completely fitting with the established style of the region.

I really appreciate the concept, to be able to quickly renovate the area and return it to the market for sale. A weekend of work! Wonderful!

I am fully in support of this proposal. I can't wait to see it realized!

This would be great for our Tuscany theme! I love it too, and as Lyubov and Brooke have said, think it would be a really good way to have an immediate upgrade fairly quickly. They are modifiable too, I believe, which would mean customizing them somewhat possible.

I do have one concern though; how will this affect our land impact? I think that we are very short of prims in LA, so if we were to purchase and install these buildings, would they be 'anchored' to public land? If so, what will we have to remove in order to compensate? If not, how would we maintain the integrity of the new village buildings?

I like this proposal very much and would be happy to see more Simay houses in LA.
My only concern is that the Simay houses I own are quite primmy and obviously made before CH came out. I had to tear mine apart to CH as much as possible to reduce the prim count

These are good concerns, considering that we already know that LA is low on public prims. Yes... I think that the houses should be anchored on public land... for the reasons of theme consistency. I think the solution is a couple of things. Yes, I'll look at each build as Lil suggests and see what I can do to lower LI. The builds I've inspected are all one linkset of standard prims plus one linkset of phantom prims. These can be combined to one linkset of CH-set prims with various prims set to physics = "None". Perhaps that will lower the counts. But most important, the proposal includes reparceling. I suspect that what I would try to do is reparcel in a way that increases the number of public prims and lowers the number of rentable prims. Sure... this lowers the total POTENTIAL total income from LA. But the project might increase the total ACTUAL income from LA... and that's the point here.

Also, even as is, the builds I've inspected are not that high in prims... not as high as many of the builds I've made for NFS and CN. These are not the Farmhouse or the Winery... they are smaller builds. So its somewhat a matter of step by step... like everything.

Sudane...............

I like them a lot too. They look very livable and remind me of wandering small lanes in Tuscany.

A further update here. I've installed a couple more of the buildings along the waterfront, to give you an idea of the style, and to give me a bit more experience in working with these old builds.

They ARE interesting. They also are primmy, as Lil pointed out, and as far as I can tell there's not much you can do to reduce this. I'd like to refer back to the LUC discussion we had at the last meeting, where we talked about the style of build that might happen here. Some suggested a European seacoast town, perhaps 18th/19th century, and Mizou even offered to create new builds with a Belgian flavor. I'm bringing this up here because I think that if we consider this step as transitional, where the SIMAY houses enable us to create a new and attractive neighborhood, but that slowly we replace them with new builds... the area transforms. The area quickly goes back on the market with neat new places to rent, but over time can become even better.

I also think that there's a bunch of things I can do to substitute many elements with lower LI options. The streets, the streetlights, many of the other elements, can be substituted. It probably all won't look exactly like the creator intended, but who cares about that? It achieves our purpose. I must say that I am genuinely enjoying my time sitting in the little SIMAY bar I've set on the south end of the bridge, reading my newspaper, contemplating our LA harbor .

Sudane........................

I have to say I have mixed - well, mostly negative - feelings about bringing a completely different style of architecture to LA. I agree the new part of LA does´t have to be italian but I think building styes from other parts of the Mediterranean Sea will fit the overall theme of LA better than something completely different.
If there was a belgian coast town (which would look lovely for sure) how will we deal with seasons and vegetation?