I restarted my game once.
For my first town I practically started without any knowledge about the game. So I just choose any old layout, put my house and permanent PWPs any place without much thought. I also came up with my name on the fly: "Forestie". But one thing just changed my whole perspective. No, I didn't learn about the villager trade, pathing, or choosing a good layout when I restarted.
What made me restart was the knowledge that Flora was in the game. Seriously. I really, really, really wanted her and at the time, I thought the only way to get her was for her to randomly move in or start with her. So I pretty much resetted my town until she was a starter. I decided as well to just have a town of all avian villagers. I didn't pick them either, I would just settle for whoever came to my village first. And I called it "Roost", referring to a place where birds (or bats) stay to rest.
Yeah, I had no idea that the Cafe was also called Roost. Though I probably wouldn't changed the name anyway.
When I finally had my second town, with Flora as a starter, I actually had a worse layout then my first town. Though at that time I was beginning to learn about villager trade and many of my other starters were high tiers (Kid Cat, Maple, ect.). So I was able to trade for the exact villagers I wanted. Plus, I learned bout cycling threads so many of the villagers I received were free.
I still put some of my PWPs in odd places, but I'm making them work. After awhile I don't like a few things in my town, like the aforementioned layout, my fruit (peaches, would have liked apples or cherries), and my train station color.
But I'm completely in love my town right now. I made some odd layout decisions, but it flows nicely for the most part and it is different any other town that I've seen. Plus, it is full of birds!