Town feels really small...

[Sir.Sims]

It's because your villagers are so spread out. If they were clustered together more, you'd have more open space and it would feel bigger.

EXACTLY! That's why I always use the trick I mentioned in my previous post. With this simple method you can control where your villagers build their houses, you can even control who is moving in!

 

[trinest]

PS: I do not want any new villagers in those 2 areas, that's why I use the "control where your villagers move"-trick. You should also do that!

Tell me about this trick.

 

[Sir.Sims]

Tell me about this trick.

Right, I forgot to add the link: Click here. The method works like a charm!

 

[Mirror]

Actually, it's almost frightening how similar OP's village layout is to mine... My river is in the exact same place! Now that I think about it, I don't find my village super small... But I heard that city folk gave pretty big maps, so it might just be you guys are so used to them that our New Leaf towns feel small. (I never had a Wii so no City Folk for me, just Wild World...)

 

[pocky]

my map feels small also
I'm having trouble placing one of my community projects because it won't fit anywhere
I think that it is because my villagers just moved all over the place and since their houses are so scattered about they've taken away space that could have been used for other things

 

[Elloriee]

Okay, the river layout is the main reason why some maps "appear smaller" than others, and ofc. the fact that you get really used to your map after 1 week or so.
So my advice would be: choose a river that divides your town into 2 equal parts! This doesn't have to mean, that you have to choose a boring, straight river course! Not at all!

I came across this amazing river layout: it is a very curvy and interesting river but it STILL divides your town in 2 equal parts (kinda diagonal)... pretty cool in my opinion. This is also my own map.

As you can see it provides lots of open space for your projects (I circled the areas that I want to use for community projects) and this map generally "feels much bigger".

PS: I do not want any new villagers in those 2 areas, that's why I use the "control where your villagers move"-trick. You should also try that! CLICK HERE.

This was really helpful! I don't really want to start over though, i've gotten so far...So I guess i'll try the "controlling where villagers live" trick