Ok, I bet a lot of people have run into the same problem that I am dealing with.
I have a lot of my production in a large complex near one corner of my map. My city is on a mountain near the center of the map.
If a residential building in the city goes: “Hey! I’m running out of home appliances!” the factories in the complex go: “Ok here you go! The shipment is on its way!”.
The problem is, there is a long train trip between the complex and the city, and way too often, the goods arrive too late.
So, here’s my suggestion:
Warehouses! A warehouse would be a small building (2x3 grid spaces) and it would have a large storage capacity. Maybe 200 items or so. When you set up a district around a warehouse, it will begin receiving extra items that the buildings in its district need. Warehouses could also manually be set to store certain items and would not require a district in that case.
The warehouse would NOT be able to starve the buildings around it of resources. When a building in the warehouse’s district goes: “Hey! I need some nanotubes!” the warehouse would output the nanotubes in its storage and supply the building in need. Vehicles headed to the warehouse would be redirected to the building. Also, if a vehicle is heading to a building, and then the building no longer needs the resources, the cargo could get dropped off at a warehouse to help build up an extra supply.
This way, the time it takes for needed resources to arrive is much less. It can work as a backup supply for resources in case of a traffic jam or other disaster. Warehouses could literally save your city in a bad situation.
And there you have it! I would love to see this concept in Infraspace!