We have all been there: you are trying to squeeze a mainline through a growing town and you bulldoze one too many houses — or worse, some trees. Suddenly, the Local Authority rating drops to ‘Appalling’ and you are banned from building so much as a bus stop.
Back in my early days, I would just give up on the town or wait years for the rating to slowly crawl back up. I felt like I was being punished for trying to help them grow! It was a major point of friction that made me want to avoid city centers entirely.
I discovered the ‘Tree Cheese’ trick (which I later found documented in the Master Hellish: Angry Mayors video). I realized the Local Authority was not a complex judge; it was a simple math equation. By planting a dense forest of trees on every empty tile within the city limits, I could ‘buy’ back my reputation in seconds. That easy!
I went from ‘Appalling’ to ‘Excellent’ before the game clock hit the next month. Now, I do not fear the bulldozer — I just keep a budget for a few hundred saplings.
There are a couple of more advanced methods - you can actually bulldoze the trees you just planted and replant them. I know it is counter intuitive but true - if planting more trees does not take you out of ‘Atrocious’ and at least get you into ‘Mediocre’, you can actually remove what you planted and replant them - a quirk in the algorithm…
Another solution is to use Sandbox options, namely turn on the ‘Magic Bulldozer’. This is a ‘cheat’ of sorts but do not feel bad for using it - since this Local Authority problem is so annoying AND you are making the rules (it is your game after all), you can legitimately enable it and it will allow you to change landscape, remove roads and buildings and do it all without any major penalty… thank me later …
Meticulous Insight: In the 'Matrix' of city logic, it does not matter if you have destroyed a thousand-year-old cathedral. If you plant enough trees, the Mayor will think you are a saint. It is a quirk of the game that reminds us: sometimes the simplest solution is the most effective.