Questions about Junk Storage

[Moonracer3000]

I'm finally putting some serious effort into making a settlement plan for the contest and hitting a point where I've hit the build limit of a settlement but the recommended junk storage is about 5k higher than I currently have. I'm wondering how important having the correct junk storage for each city plan level is, both for the actual mechanic of the plan upgrading and how much that would hurt a plan's chances.

Is it a big enough deal that I should scrap parts of the city to make room for storage? Does having a caravan plot negate this issue (since you can use junk from other settlements)? If a level 2 city only has 8k junk storage but requires 10k to upgrade will it just never upgrade to level 3?

I watched the city planning/contest videos and poked around but it wasn't entirely clear.

 

[kinggath]

It would eventually upgrade without the requirement if the settlement ended up on the Caravan Network.

It won't hurt your chances to not have it, it would just make it more user friendly for players to do so. If you are using Place Everywhere, you can actually shrink the containers down using the scale hotkeys and tuck them in places out of the way to avoid needing to redo your whole deisgn.

 

[Moonracer3000]

Good to know there is some flexibility, thanks.
I noticed the scaling trick. I actually enjoy incorporating the storage into the environment (the large storage items make great barricade pieces). I think a big issue is getting a better feel for what works within the build limit. I'm at the point where I'm happy with the layout and deciding over decorations or junk storage (with not enough space for either).