Game patches are available at Maxis' Official SimCity 4 site. See their patch section, or if you have the game installed, use the updates shortcut link that was installed with your game. The patches fix several bugs, enhance performance, and add some gameplay improvements.
This is my personal region created using Rush Hour and one of the regions (Maxisland) that comes with the original game. It has 3.3 million sims and has just about every structure possible, obtained as naturally as possible. It's a good reference for users trying to build larger regions or who just want a built-out region to explore.