Saarlouis

– Luh mo lo, dat is doch Saarlouis!
– Eijo!
– Oh leck!
A conversation in local dialect after seeing this map

The map has been voted as "Map of the month – December 2020" by BonBonB’s What Map community. Thank you for your support.

1) Thanks to adamtaylor12345 in the comments for the hint that 4 lane road with bus lanes required After Dark. I replaced it with a regular 4 lane road and removed the After Dark requirement.
2) BonBonB reviewed this map in his show. It received whooping 13/15 stars and obtained a BonBonB seal of approval. The video can be found above. All issues mentioned in the video and in the comments below have been tackled with the latest update of the map. And @BonBonB: Thank you for your time creating this review, it has been a pleaure.

This map tries to be a 1:1 representation of the area around Saarlouis[en.wikipedia.org] in the marvellous Saarland[en.wikipedia.org] in Germany at the border with France. The represented area spans roughly from Völklingen in the southeast, to Rehlingen or Beckingen in the north-west. The real life location is very diverse and offers a high contrast ranging from the rolling hills of the rural Saargau, to ironworks in Völklingen (UNESCO world heritage[www.voelklinger-huette.org]) and Dillingen and a Ford car factory and suppliers around Saarlouis. The former coal mining history of the region can even be seen on its height map: The highest point of the map is the plateau of the spoil tip in Ensdorf and the three very pointed tips of the spoil heaps “Hermann and Dorothea” in Hostenbach are very distinct and easy spot.
The map has plenty of building space for you (>90%).

The map uses only low-poly trees… but it uses 907.607 of them and thus requires the unlimited tree mod.

As always, you can use any LUT you like. However, the LUT that can be seen during the video is the Overcast-Natural by Catch22. If using this LUT and the Daylight Classic Mod, then I recommend to switch all to AfterDark.

The Autobahn A6 and A8 provide outside connections to Germany as well as the Bundesstraße B269 / Route Nationale N 33 provides an outside connection to France. Other Bundesstraßen (~ National roads) are represented as well but they do not have an outside connection.

The main rail along the Saar as well as the Primstal rail and the Niedtal rail are connecting to the outside. The Rosseltal and Bisttal rail lines are out-of-service and partially dismantled.

Despite the inland port at Dillingen, I discarded shipping lines, as this would require multiple mods to ensure a good gaming experience (advanced vehicle options + river ships + ship path anarchy) and I wanted to have the requirements as small as possible. However if additional mods are no problem for you, then you can add shipping lines easily using Unlimited Outside Connections (Beta) and More Network Stuff by BloodyPenguin.

Two flight paths are available.

Saarlouis was originally founded as Sarre-Louis in 1680 after France occupied the duchy of Lorraine in the 1670 to 1672 and was going to stay after the treaty of Nijmegen in 1679. It was planned as fortress by Sébastien Le Prestre de Vaubaun[en.wikipedia.org] and Thomas de Choisy and was located at the banks of the river Saar to defend the eastern border of France. The hexagonal shape of the city results from the modern fortification techniques of that epoch and a lock even provided the possibility to flood the surrounding areas to slow down enemy attacks. The city becomes the capital of the Sarre Province in 1685 and remains a French exclave on Lorraine soil after the peace of Rijswijk in 1697. During the French revolution, it is named Sarre-Libre until 1810. In 1815, after the peace of Paris, the city is handed over to the Prussian Empire. In 1889, the now obsolete fortifications are slighted, but the original layout of the city can still be seen nowadays. The city of Neuf-Brisach[en.wikipedia.org] with a similar layout and size is still preserved until today and gives a good example how Saarlouis looked like.

The Citadel of Lille pack of Raymond Pelletier can be used to re-create the fortress. As Vauban used the local materials to construct its fortresses, the citadel of Lille uses brick-stone while Saarlouis was built with sandstone. However, I have not included the fortifications in the release of this map to give the player more freedom. Instead, I placed a row of trees to mark the original borders of the fortress.

If you want to get a feeling of the real location, check out the following videos:

A video overlooking the Saar valley from the Teufelsburg (castle):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gbcOJINi8pA

Drone footage from the Saarland including much of this area:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8dxE8dKUGs

A video of Tim the Traveller about the history of the Saarland:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZ3vhPYex90

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