I was just looking into city builder games this weekend, after having binged on SC4000 for two weeks. There are actually a lot of new city builder games on the market, but their focus is mostly more narrow than the original SC series.
But I do think there's a lot of freedom in terms of how you play and shape the game using mods.
To me CS is more of a weird mix of Factorio and a bonsai tree. I need to tend to it from time to time, slow down the gameplay and trim here and there (plop a new neighbourhood or a small detail). Fixing traffic issues is a small part of it (in my case).
I loved SC2000 and SC3000, but now SC4 (edit: SC4, not SC4000) feels just really ugly.
The parklife DLC greatly enhances the painting aspect.
I really need to start looking at tutorials or something