There are 2 things I think could be added that would make it better.

1. Show how many cultural points I'm getting per turn. I tend to conquer other civs (even minors) because their civ capitals give you more culture points. Some other buildings offer culture points too.

2. Let the player pick ideology traits in advance. So when they can afford them, they're picked automatically.

I was going to say let the player know when they can afford a new trait, but traits tend to have different costs. It'd be annoying to get several popups saying you pick a trait several times before you can afford the one you want.