How to Use City Time Machine 3D - Step by Step
City Time Machine 3D puts one 3D city block in your browser with a timeline that runs from 1945 to 2055. Drag the slider and the block's buildings, vehicles, storefront signs, street lights, and pedestrians transform live in front of you, one era at a time.
Open the scene and take the camera
Open the page and drag on the scene to orbit around the block; scroll - or pinch on a phone - to zoom right down to street level. A fullscreen control plays it big, and on low-powered devices the scene trims vehicles, pedestrians, and props so the block stays smooth.
Drag the timeline through six eras
Six years sit on the slider: 1945, 1965, 1985, 2005, 2025, and 2055. Move it and the whole block morphs over about two seconds - buildings shrink and regrow one lot after another while the sky, fog, and light crossfade to the era. It is an animated change, not a cut, and a second slider move mid-transition retargets cleanly. Clicking any era label jumps straight to that year.
Follow one lot through the decades
Each of the sixteen lots keeps its own footprint through time, so pick a corner and stay with it: the small 1945 corner shop grows into the same corner's 1985 office and, decades later, its 2055 tower. Between moves the street stays alive - vehicles drive both roads, pedestrians walk the sidewalks, and in 2055 hover craft bob above the road on glow rings.
Read the signs and lights
Storefront signs carry invented generic names, because this is a stylized, artistic take on architectural eras - not a historical record of any real city, street, or business. Signage and street lamps restyle with each era: neon signs flicker in the neon eras, and holographic signs rotate and pulse in 2055, which the page openly treats as speculative fiction.
Sound, memory, and what it is not
Street ambience is synthesized in your browser and stays off until you enable it - there are no audio files, just a per-era hum once it is on. Your last era is remembered in this browser only; there are no accounts, server saves, or leaderboards. And it is not a city-building game: no economy, no build tools - the timeline is the interaction.
Wondering when a two-minute era-hop actually fits the day? See when City Time Machine 3D is worth opening.
To see how City Time Machine 3D compares with an installed city app, see City Time Machine 3D vs alternatives.
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