SacCity is not sweeping separated bikeways

Dan Allison1 Comment

The City of Sacramento is not sweeping its separated bikeways, as it promised to do when it installed them. The separated bikeways, on I St, P St, Q St, 9th St, 10th St, 19th St, and 21st St have not been swept by the city. The city has a sweeper designed specifically for these bikeways. It may be broken down, or the city may be choosing not to sweep. Some of the bikeways are being swept by landscape maintenance services associated with adjacent properties, a few spots are being swept by individual owners or residents, and even the parks department is cleaning up, but not consistently.

photo of Q St at 14th St, separated bikeway, not swept by city
Q St at 14th St, separated bikeway, not swept by city

In a few places that have heavier bicycle and scooter traffic, such as P St between 15th and 14th, the leaves have turned into leaf slime, which is extremely hazardous for anyone on two wheels. I’ve seen people almost spin out here, and I have as well.

Most people seem to have realized that the place for piled leaves is NOT in the bikeway, but in the adjacent buffer, and in some locations that buffer is labeled as such. But some people are still piling in the bikeway.

Regular bike lanes are an issue as well. Most are not swept. Dry leaves are sometimes swept away be motor vehicle traffic, but once they are wet, they don’t move. If there is motor vehicle traffic across or along the bike lane, such as approaching an intersection, the leaves are quickly turned into slime. Very slippery! Be cautious anywhere there are leaves.

Palm trees – ack!

And just in case you need to be reminded, palm trees and the fronds they drop are an ongoing hazard to people walking and bicycling. A single frond can block a sidewalk from use by anyone with a mobility device. A single frond can block a bikeway or bike lane, and can throw a bike rider off their bike. With every wind storm or heavy rain storm, palm trees drop huge numbers of fronds. Why do we continue to allow this hazard for walkers and bicyclists? In a few locations where they have historic value, such as Capitol Park, they might be justifiable. But nowhere else. They need to be removed!

photo of palm fronds on Q St
palm fronds on Q St

this week 2024-12-16

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

SacMoves Coalition hosts an event calendar at https://sacmoves.org/events/, which is maintained by STAR (Sacramento Transit Advocates and Riders) and Getting Around Sacramento.

Monday 16

Tuesday 17

Wednesday 18

  • House Sacramento ? (uncertain meeting date)

Thursday 19

Friday 20

Saturday 21

  • Winter Solstice

Sunday 22

red light cameras and law enforcement

Dan Allison2 Comments

Earlier posts on red light running and automated enforcement are available at category: automated enforcement.

The City of Sacramento has a crisis in biased law enforcement against people of color and low income, and also has a crisis of red light running.

The city had red light cameras at eleven locations, part of a program managed by Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office. The county dropped the program in early 2024, and all cameras were removed. The county claimed that the fines from red light running were not paying the cost of the program, and of the contractor. The City of Sacramento therefore dropped its program and has made no effort to restart it. At the dollar value of human life being $10M or more, it is hard to understand how the county saw this program as too costly. City of Sacramento paid $27M in traffic crash lawsuits over five years. The county information does not seem to be available, but it would likely be larger due to higher population, more road miles, and more poorly designed roadways and intersections.

The nature of red light running is that a motor vehicle driver T-bones someone, impacting other motor vehicles, walkers and bicyclists at a perpendicular angle at high speeds, frequently resulting in a fatality. This is not the leading cause of fatalities, but it is significant.

There are reasonable objections to any law enforcement of traffic laws. Traffic stops are often pre-textual, intended to discover illegal activity or warrants that have nothing to do with traffic law, and to oppress people of color and low income. Law enforcement officers not infrequently escalate interactions, resulting in intimidation, unlawful arrest, and death. Law enforcement often focuses on communities with people of color and low income, both because of the pre-textual nature of stops and intended intimidation of people in those communities. Even when justified, tickets for traffic violations have an outsized impact on lower income people because fines are a flat amount no matter the income of the violator, so are strongly regressive. Court fees add a great deal to the cost of a ticket, often sending low-income people in a downward economic and legal spiral. 

Automated enforcement of traffic law removes some of these concerns, but not others. By removing the interaction with officers, law enforcement intimidation and violence is eliminated. But the issue of outsized economic impact remains.

If a red light camera program were to be restarted in the City of Sacramento, it would have to have these characteristics:

  1. The program would be operated by Public Works as part of their transportation management responsibilities, not by the Police Department.
  2. Camera locations would be selected based on traffic crash location hot-spots, but adjusted so that low-income communities do not have a higher number of cameras per-capita than other areas 
  3. For camera locations with a history of traffic crashes resulting in fatalities and severe injuries, and with a higher than average number of citations issued, the city would commit to making changes to that intersection to reduce the incidence of red light running and crashes.
  4. The fines for red light running would be reduced for low-income people. The reduction could be a) across the board for income levels below a certain set percentage of the median household income, or b) based on the value of the vehicle driven by the violator. Alternatives to fines could also be implemented. Though income based fines are often mentioned, and are used in other countries, concerns about privacy and availability of the data make this impractical. The value of a vehicle is easily available, and does track to some degree with the income of the owner. It is not certain whether these options could be implemented by the city now, or if changes in state law would be required, but the city should commit to exploring options and committing to a solution.

Two other types of automated law enforcement have been discussed. Automated speed cameras are legal under a pilot program for several cities, but Sacramento is not one of them. It is unlikely that other cities would be added, or statewide implementation would occur before the pilot is completed. It is possible that active intelligent speed assistance will become law in California, and obviate the need for automated speed enforcement, at least in urban areas.

Automated enforcement of ‘failure to yield’ to walkers (pedestrians) law would be very useful. Failure to yield sometimes results in fatalities and severe injuries, but it always results in intimidation of people walking by people driving, reducing the frequency and comfort of walking trips. The technology for detection of ‘failure to yield’ is not well developed, but has been implemented in some cities and is practical. ‘Failure to yield’ is another crisis on our roadways.

This recommendation to restart the red light camera program in the city does not indicate that it is the primary solution to the traffic violence crisis. It is one among many tools. Changes to the roadway, temporary (quick-build) or permanent, are by far the most effective solution and should be the lead action by the city.

influences: podcasts

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I’ll be make a few posts on things that influence my thinking about transportation and housing, in case you are unaware of them and would like to check them out. First, podcasts.

Talking Headways: A podcast on Streetsblog by Jeff Wood about a wide ranging issues in transportation. A ‘Monday’s at the Overhead Wire’ analyzes items in the news, while the main ‘Talking Headways’ has in-depth interviews with individual leaders or panels.

The War on Cars: A podcast on efforts to make streets safer and overcome automobile dominance.

The Strong Towns Podcast: A podcast covering the breadth of Strong Towns concepts and current issues.

Arrested Mobility: A podcast on the ways in which automobile dominance and funding limit the mobility of Blacks and people of color, by Charles T Brown.

Strong Towns Upzoned: Another Strong Towns podcast, this one going in-depth on recent news articles.

The Break: A podcast on Streetsblog USA on current issues in transportation safety and equity, by Kea Wilson.

99% Invisible, a podcast on urban form and other topics, used to be my favorite, but it became so dominated by advertising that I stopped listening.

this week 2024-12-09

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

SacMoves Coalition hosts an event calendar at https://sacmoves.org/events/, which is maintained by STAR (Sacramento Transit Advocates and Riders) and Getting Around Sacramento.

Monday

  • SacRT Board, 4:00 PM, 1102 Q Street 4 thFloor, Suite 4600, Sacramento (close to 13th St light rail) or steaming from website during meeting; comment in person or by email to boardcomments@sacrt.com before 1:00 PM on Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

  • Organizing for Bicycle and Pedestrian Safety Coalition December Meeting, 11:30 AM via Zoom; this is a collection of interest groups on transportation and equity, organized by Civic Thread; if this applies, and your organization is not already on the invite list, email Julia Jackson Oill, Jjacksonoill@civicthread.org

Thursday

Friday

Saturday

Sunday

  • Strong SacTown walk audit for daylighting, 10:00 AM, Temple Coffee, 1615 16th St, Sacramento
  • Strong SacTown Member Mingle, 1:00 PM, Kupros Craft House, 1217 21st St, Sacramento

Strong SacTown: Things that work: traffic posts

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Things That Work: Traffic Posts is the eighth post by Strong SacTown to improve and promote the City of Sacramento update to its Street Design Standards. Other posts at tag: street design standards.

“You don’t often hear news about the crashes that didn’t happen. Today we’d like to highlight something already making real-world safety impacts in Sacramento: traffic posts (aka. delineators) on 15th & 16th Streets in Downtown. These traffic posts reduce the speed of cars (and severity of injuries) as well as channelize traffic – stopping cars from changing lanes at the crosswalk and potentially striking pedestrians who have started crossing.

SacCity Council to consider extending Howard Chan

Dan Allison5 Comments

On the agenda for the Sacramento City Council for this Tuesday, December 10, is an extension of Howard Chan’s contract for one year, to December 31, 2025. Approval of an Amendment of the City Manager’s Employment Agreement

I am opposed to this extension. The city is in crisis, a crisis due to both the City Manager form of government, and to the individual in the position of City Manager. Both must end, as soon as possible. Extending Howard Chan for a year ensures that the crisis will continue, for at least a year.

What is the crisis? There is a budgetary crisis. The City Manager failed to see a reduction in tax income coming, and so there was a sudden need to balance the city budget by cutting critical programs, but failing to reduce excess staff. The budget crunch is now being used to justify all kinds poor decisions by city staff and city council. There is a homeless crisis. The City Manager has failed to follow the direction of council to address homelessness by opening more homeless shelters, specifically in every council district.

Most importantly, there is a traffic violence crisis. The rate of traffic crashes resulting in fatalities and severe injuries continues to escalate, putting Sacramento at or near the top of most dangerous cities in California. Yet Howard Chan has refused to allocate city general funds to address this issue, beyond the minimum necessary for grant matches. The grants are long term solutions, when what is also needed is immediate change to roadways, called quick build, at high risk intersections where the fatalities and severe injuries occur. Howard Chan has refused to fund this. The city is considering Declaring a State of Emergency Regarding Traffic Deaths. If Howard Chan had not resisted funding for real solutions for the last eight years, it is unlikely that we would need this emergency declaration. Not that we would not have traffic fatalities – Vision Zero has been a failure for many reasons – but the rate would likely be much less.

Howard Chan believes that the only solution to the public safety crisis is to add more police officers. This is a misunderstanding of public safety. Expenditures, and staff, should reflect actual threats to the public. In Sacramento, they do not. The number of people killed in traffic crashes is similar to the number of people killed by gun and knife violence. Traffic collisions increase, the police budget increases, but the police budget does nothing to address the problem.

Darrell Steinberg, in his ‘exit interview’ with Ryan Lillis earlier this week at New Helvetia Brewing said that a partial solution for the failure of the City Manager model would be to give the Mayor hire and fire authority over the City Manager, subject to review by the council. If this had been in place, we might already have a new city manager. Darrell said that he had a good relationship with Chan, but clearly the council does not, and Darrell acknowledged that the City Manager model is failing Sacramento.

What are the alternatives? The National League of Cities has a page: Cities 101 — Forms of Local Government, which outlines five forms of city governance. Sacramento does not have exactly any of these categories, but is closest to Council-Manager. Sacramento elects its mayor as a specific office, not a rotating selection. Most significantly, in Sacramento, the council actually has very little control over the manager. I believe we need something closer to the Mayor-Council model, where the city manager works for the council, which governs on behalf of the citizens. could a council-manager model work? Perhaps, but only with a strong council or mayor that is willing to stand up to the city manager and hold that person accountable.

Sacramento voters have twice rejected a strong mayor model, probably in part due to getting burned by Kevin Johnson who wanted to be a strong mayor. It seems unlikely that voters would support a strong mayor. What I want to see is a strong council model, where the council proactively directs the City Manager, and fires that person if they are not following direction. Something must change.

Our city is in crisis because we have a failed governance model, and the wrong person in the City Manager position. Rather than just extending the City Manager for a year, the council must come to terms with the crisis, and determine a solution. As quickly as possible.

this week 2024-12-02

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

SacMoves Coalition hosts an event calendar at https://sacmoves.org/events/, which is maintained by STAR (Sacramento Transit Advocates and Riders) and Getting Around Sacramento.

Monday

  • Sacramento Climate Coalition: To participate in this monthly meeting, please email info@sacclimate.org to be added to the list and receive Zoom link.

Tuesday

  • CalBike 2025 Agenda Reveal: Shaping The Next Thirty Years: registration

Wednesday

  • Wonk Wednesday: Darrell Steinberg: in-person at New Helvetia Brewing, 7:00 PM; can’t confirm time

Thursday

Friday

  • CAP (Clean Air Partnership) Virtual Technical Advisory: 2025 Blueprint: 10:00 AM, via Zoom, registration

Saturday

Sunday

SacCity Neighborhood Connections

Dan Allison2 Comments

City of Sacramento held the second of two workshops on the Neighborhood Connections element of the Active Transportation Plan on Wednesday at noon. About 40 people participated, and there were many questions and comments. I was not able to participate in the first workshop a week ago, but I imagine the content and discussions were similar. The presentation given during the workshop is available.

A draft plan (SacCity Neighborhood Connections Plan 2024-10) is available for public review and comment through December 1.

There are four appendices to the plan:

You can comment in the body of these documents by using the Konveio tool (scroll down on the Streets for People Active Transportation Plan webpage to the box with a green bar at the top), or submitting by email to StreetsForPeople@cityofsacramento.org.

Read More »

Whither daylighting?

Dan Allison2 Comments

See crosswalk daylighting in SacCity? for more information.

The city has confirmed that crosswalk daylighting, as required by AB 413 (2023, Lee), will not be a part of the Parking Strategies project. The city has also confirmed that it will not be a part of the Streets for All Active Transportation Plan, though that plan will recognize that where there is space created by daylighting, it may be used for bicycle and scooter parking.

So where will crosswalk daylighting be addressed? So far as can be determined, the city does not intend to address it at all. A search of the city website for ‘AB 413’ or ‘daylighting’ produces nothing. City staff seems to be suggesting that it will be addressed somewhere else, not part of the current projects, though that somewhere else has not been mentioned.

It is going to take public pressure to convince the city to take action on crosswalk daylighting.

San Francisco has been proactive in implementing the state law, with warning notices now being given, and enforcement starting January 1. Parking is far more contentious in San Francisco than Sacramento, so it is surprising that Sacramento is stalled while San Francisco is moving forward.