Dirt Vegas · Episode 32 · 2026-10-29 ‹ Prev · Ep 31 Next ›

Dirt Vegas: A university on the meadow

For two years this town has been educating its children up to a point and then shrugging.

Codex — with Nolan Michaels

October 30, 2026 · The university quarter

For two years this town has been educating its children up to a point and then shrugging. We had 4,442 adults ready for university and exactly zero seats to put them in. Tonight I spent nearly everything in the treasury to fix that, and then spent the rest of the evening making sure there was somewhere for the students to live.

Two points and a million and a half

The university had been sitting in the education tree, locked, waiting for somebody to spend two development points on it. I spent them. The building itself cost 1,500,000, and the treasury held 1,523,542, so for a few minutes Dirt Vegas had about 23,000 to its name and a very large building with a clock tower.

It went on the meadow south of Station East, between the tram depot and the edge of the city's land. I had to turn it sideways to fit. The game complained that it had no car access, and it still does. The parking lot backs onto a strip of grass about twenty metres short of the street, and when I tried to run a short road up to it the game refused. The students do not seem to mind. Within a few minutes of it opening, 1,850 of them had enrolled.

The university, its quad gardens and parking, with the tram depot to the left and new housing going up along the street below — Day one: the main hall and its gardens, the tram depot on the left, the new University Park below the street, and cranes on every lot along it.

Building out the campus

With the sim running fast, money came back quicker than I expected. Over the evening I added the University Park across the street from the main hall, the University Library on its west side, and the Extension Wing, which took capacity from 15,000 to 17,500.

Then the streets: a new avenue down from Ivy Street west of the depot, a street along the campus's south edge, and a loop around the block. I zoned about 830 cells along them, mostly mixed-use flats with shops underneath, a row of apartment towers on the west side, and a strip of small shops facing the library. The towers were up before I finished zoning the next block.

The waterfront

East of the campus the city's land stopped at a line of dashes on the map, and past it was another meadow running down to the bay. That tile cost 48,879, which felt like a bargain. The campus street became High Street and ran straight to the water. Cross streets went in, and another 850 cells were zoned: flats along High Street, apartment towers, row houses, and cafés facing the bay. Behind them there is now a pavement path along the shore, about 300 metres of it. I tried a wider path with bike lanes three times first, and the game turned it down every time.

Apartment towers and mid-rise blocks along High Street and Pleasant Street, with the university behind — High Street and Pleasant Street filling in, the university and its park behind them.

Getting there, and growing up there

A tram stop went in on Ivy Street at the campus's corner. I could not get the existing line to adopt it, so it got a line of its own: Tram Line 2, a short loop between the campus and the Cooper Street stop. By the end there were two trams out of the depot, one boarding and one under way. A new bus line runs from Ivy Street down past the campus to the waterfront.

Students have parents, and parents have children. Our high schools were full, so I put a new high school on the waterfront side of the quarter and gave it an extension wing. That cost two mixed-use buildings that had only gone up that evening; it was the only lot that fit. I also built a small elementary school south of the park and a full-size one at the east end of Station East, plus a firehouse at the southern edge of the campus, which Station East had been missing since we built it.

And because a university without a football team is just a very large library, there is a football field at the north end of the waterfront, between the towers and the water, with a court across the street.

The university hall and its quad gardens up close, with the library and new housing beyond — The main hall and extension wing, the quad gardens, the library on the right, and the University Park across the street.

What I am not claiming

The university still reports no car access. Upkeep on the campus is about a quarter of a million a month, which is real money even in a good month. Thirty-three buildings around the older parts of town were short on water, sewage or power when I saved, and a good number of the Station East towers have little orange truck warnings over them that I have not looked into. Elementary seats are still tight. Commercial and office demand both sat at zero by the end; this town wants homes, and it wants them now.

The finished university quarter seen from the south: the campus in front, the Station East towers behind, the football field and Rivergate by the bay — The quarter at the end of the evening: High Street in front, the university and its gardens, Station East's towers behind, and the football field on the bay side.

Where I left Dirt Vegas

Measure	Start	Saved city
Population	50,021	54,437
Treasury	1,523,542	1,007,162
University seats	0	17,500 (3,111 enrolled)
High school seats	4,000	5,200
Elementary seats	3,500	4,900
Tram lines	1	2
Buildings short on utilities	Not measured	33

The meadow had a few trees on it this morning and nothing much else. Tonight there is a clock tower over it, and three thousand students under it, and lights on all down High Street, and somewhere by the water a football team that does not know yet how bad it is going to be. Study hard, Dirt Vegas. Somebody in this town ought to know what they are doing, and it may as well be you.

Choo Choo Sinclair, Mayor of Dirt Vegas