zots are when you have $$$ residents move out of $$$ residential areas because they can't find fancy work (hi-tech industry, $$$ commercial, etc) and the house eventually becomes abandoned
Oh, I see. In the unmodded game, commute time is one of the biggest problems people have, and a lot of people resort to using mods and "cheating", but you can handle it perfectly fine in the default simulation.
First, you gotta make sure that there are jobs available that fit the sims' wealth level and education level. Second, you gotta make sure that they can get to work in time.
For the first factor, just satisfying the demand graphs will usually suit you just fine. Poor, stupid sims will be just fine working in dirty industry or low wealth commercial services. Eventually, you gradually add an elementary school. Then later, you add a high school, then a collage, as you see you sims' education level by age slowly max out for each given age group.
Better education will raise land values, and prompt them to upgrade to a richer status, then eventually you should see higher wealth commercial and industrial jobs open up. High Tech industry is tricky, though, as you can't build it next to the polluting industries, so you have to make a nice, High Tech only sector in a clean part of your city, or in a neighboring zone.
As for traffic, in the beginning put bus stops every block. Buses don't contribute to congestion at all. As long as there is a bus stop in walking distance from a residential area and a job, the sims will probably take it. Eventually when the city density becomes heavier, add subways.
I've had cities with 700k+ sims in a medium size map that's not even half full yet on hard difficulty, no mods, so it's possible.
ff -CPUCount:1"
