Alternative rules for SimCity: The Card Game
I found some house rules for SimCity here (TXT), which don't address all of your issues, but had some interesting ideas, such as:


If playing the common deck game, then consider splitting the deck further as follows:  


One pile for Phase 1 &amp; 2 cards + Phase 3 Power Plants + Council Members
One pile for Phase 3 &amp; 4 cards + Events
One pile for Long cards
You may draw from the Phase 1 &amp; 2 deck anytime
You may draw from the Phase 3 &amp; 4 deck in phases 2-4
You may draw from the Long Cards in Phases 3 &amp; 4

You may play one event card in addition to placing a block on your turn (presumably to done down events)
Minimum size of a zone or complex before it counts as a zone / complex is 2.  City Services are wild for all zones in the normal way.
The Zone and Complex Bonus are calculated normally, except that only cards which are within 2 blocks of the block being played count as within the complex / zone for purposes of calculating the bonus.


I haven't played SimCity before, so I can't say for certainty how useful his rules are, but they look promising.