Tag: Sacramento General Plan 2040

without parking reform, Sac General Plan will fail

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

If the City of Sacramento General Plan 2040 update is approved, with its very weak language about parking management, it is almost guaranteed that the objectives of the entire plan will fail, because parking is such a key aspect of how our transportation system and built environment look and function. Parking must be reformed, and the reform must be transformative and immediate. Vague language about what might happen in the future, in the 16 years of the plan, is pretty much a guarantee that not much of anything will happen. The city has strongly resisted proactively managing parking, and the General Plan would continue this resistance. [Since I refer to the Mobility Element of the General Plan so much, I have extracted those 30 pages here. However, to really understand how a lack of parking reform will harm everything else, you will have to refer to the rest of the plan.]

The goals and policies Mobility element is the place where most language about parking resides. Curb management, items M-2.10 through M-2.13 (page 8-17), and Parking Management M-2.14 through M-2.19 (pages 8-17 to 8-18) are worth a read. I have previously written about M-2.17 Parking Management Strategy. This item says that the city will ‘continue’ its parking management strategy. The city has no parking management strategy, at least none ever shared with the public. So ‘continue’ means it is likely that nothing will change. The most important words in the item, however, are ‘could include’. Not will include, not will include on a deadline, but ‘could’. Can you imaging any more wishy-washy wording?

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Sac one-way to two-way

Dan Allison2 Comments

The City of Sacramento Downtown Mobility Project includes the conversion of two one-way street segments to two-way. Specifically, I Street from 15th St to 21st St, and 5th Street from I St to X St. The time frame for these changes was projected to be 2021.

Note that 5th Street is already two-way from L St to J St, and from I St to Railyards Blvd. One-way 5th Street significantly handicaps access from the south to and from Sacramento Valley Station.

Downtown Mobility Plan

The 2040 Sacramento General Plan mobility element Proposed Roadway Changes map (10MB; this is from the City Council agenda item 15 for January 19, 2021, I’ve not found it on the city website) indicates additional one-way to two-way conversions in the central city. On the clip of the city-wide map showing the central city, below in pinkish, these are small sections of 3rd St, sections of 7th St and 8th St, one block of 16th St, small sections of 19th St and 21st St, sections of G St and H St, some additional sections of I St, a long section of N St, and small sections of L St and P St under the Business 80/Capital City freeway. There is no indication of sequencing of these conversions in documents available so far, but since the plan is a 20 year plan, I would hope that these conversion are prioritized for the next five years.

2040 Sacramento General Plan, Proposed Roadway Changes, excerpt

I’ve written a number of times about the safety hazards of one-way streets and recommendations for converting them in Sacramento: One-way streets, again; 5th Street mess at Sac Valley Station; more on conversion to two-way streets; street changes. When these additional conversions are implemented, the central city will be closer to my ideal of no one-way streets except when there is a separated (protected) bikeway on the street. An even this is questionable, as it increases safety for bicyclists but does little to increase safety for walkers.

Someone recently asked when the streets in the central city were converted to one-way, and I don’t know. Anyone out there have information?