This scenery replaces the default Golden Gate Bridge and San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge with more detailed gmax versions. I have also revised the coastlines around the Golden Gate area in an attempt to make that area more realistic.
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Installation of bridges
1. Unzip the "Bay Area Bridges" Folder into the addon scenery directory or folder of your choice.
If using the NorCal Megascenery, replace the "bay_bridge.bgl" and "bay_bridge_1.bgl" scenery files with the "bay_bridge_mega.bgl" and "bay_bridge_1_mega.bgl" files, located in the "megascenery files" folder. *Make sure the originals are not in the scenery folder!
You can choose if you want textured cars on the Golden Gate bridge at night. Either backup or replace the "golden_gate1_lm.bmp" in the texture folder with the one in the "no headlights" folder. Default texture is with headlights and cars.
2. Backup the file "HP915180.bgl" located in the "Flight Simulator 9/scenery/NAMW/scenery/" folder. I just renamed that file "HP915180.bgl.original". Then place the file "HP915180_new.bgl" into the "Flight Simulator 9/scenery/NAMW/scenery/" folder. If you are not comfortable replacing this default file, you can skip this step. However, the terrain mesh around the revised coastlines won't be as detailed, and the terrain won't match up with the GG bridge.
3. Add the scenery the usual way by using the scenery library function in Flight Simulator.
With NorCal Megascenery, make sure the Bay Area Bridges scenery entry is above the Megascenery layers on the scenery list.
That's it!
4. To remove the scenery, simply reverse the above steps.
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Known Issues
1. I recommend using a terrain mesh of at least 38.2m resolution. Without this, the Golden Gate bridge doesn't line up correctly with the land.
2. The bridges' textures may unrealistically flash and shimmer from further away. This is due to the nature of the alpha textures, and if you know how to stop this, any help would be kindly appreciated.
3. The Bay Bridge ends don't correctly line up with the default roads. I tried to place it the best I could, and I didn't want to mess around with the default coastlines in that area. The Megascenery version, (bay_bridge_mega.bgl), is placed more accurately with respect to the real-world roads and coastlines. This version should also work better with Flight1's USA Roads. The default roads also don't line up anymore near the southern end of the Golden Gate bridge.
4. The autogen around the bridges might dissapear. I'm not sure of the cause of this, but i think it might be gmax related...
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Thanks go to the many free scenery design resources on the internet which helped me create this scenery, including the AVSIM scenery design forum, and Coast-line-Maker by Iain Murray. I hope you enjoy this scenery as much as I did did in making it! If you have any questions or comments, please e-mail me at mikemahat@hotmail.com. Also please do not upload without my permission.
