Sacramento Proposal/Approval/Construction Thread - III

[wburg]

Why would I be surprised at that?


If your argument is that preservationists don't have perspective because they don't travel, then I assume that you'd be surprised, because we do travel, and we have our own perspective.

Yes, cities like Paris have 1200 year old buildings. Sacramento doesn't. The oldest building we have isn't even 200 years old! But in no way does that mean that we shouldn't take steps to preserve our historic buildings, any more than the fact that there are 2000-3000 year old buildings in Greece or Egypt means that the 1200 year old buildings in Paris aren't worth saving.

Many folks here seem convinced that I want to save every old building. This isn't true! I think every old building deserves some consideration, to look at its role in the city's history (keeping in mind that we're a 150 year old city, not an ancient European city) and its present-day role. Sometimes, that means the building has to go--but they all deserve, at least, some consideration and investigation.

During our "urban renewal" era, we didn't have Haussman--we had a whole different crowd, who looked at the multi-story, mixed-use, transit-accessible and walkable neighborhood right by the river and declared it "blight." They destroyed it utterly, and scattered the community that lived there. That destruction had effects throughout the city: it killed off the remaining businesses on K Street, and contributed to the growth of sprawling suburbs through destruction of central-city housing.

Why did it happen? Development without forethought. I'd rather not repeat that mistake, even if it means (horrors!) leaving a funky old wooden building standing a while longer.

That's my perspective.

[BrianSac]

Yes, cities like Paris have 1200 year old buildings. Sacramento doesn't. The oldest building we have isn't even 200 years old! But in no way does that mean that we shouldn't take steps to preserve our historic buildings, any more than the fact that there are 2000-3000 year old buildings in Greece or Egypt means that the 1200 year old buildings in Paris aren't worth saving.

You are missing the point: Neither Greece, Eygpt nor Paris have Rex like structures from their first 100 years (well, maybe a few somewhere, and in museums). Did they lose their character, heritage, and economic vitality, I think not, rather those cities evolved. All great cities evolve.

Why did it happen? Development without forethought. I'd rather not repeat that mistake, even if it means (horrors!) leaving a funky old wooden building standing a while longer. That's my perspective.

I’m sure Heller will put a lot of forethought and perspective into what they are going to build at 20th and Capitol. It just might not be your Perspective, but we still believe in free enterprise in this country, and since he owns the lot and not you I think his perspective carries a little more weight than yours. But when the time comes to save a 1965 stucco one story apartment building in midtown you can provide all the historical perspective you want.

During our "urban renewal" era, we didn't have Haussman--we had a whole different crowd, who looked at the multi-story, mixed-use, transit-accessible and walkable neighborhood right by the river and declared it "blight."

Actually, Haussman did a lot of clear cutting of buildings in Paris, yet it still survived. More importantly, The urban renewal insanity of the mid-century is over. I think we have learned from our mistakes.

[wburg]

More importantly, The urban renewal insanity of the mid-century is over. I think we have learned from our mistakes.

Some have learned--the ones who have studied history, anyhow. Those who haven't...well, there's a famous quote about that. And from what I'm seeing, a lot of folks building buildings in this town haven't learned those lessons yet.

[ozone]

I agree pretty much with what BrianSac said. :previous: wburg can you give us some examples of leasons not learned- in the Central City?



The "urban renewal" fiasco in this country was often times nothing more than a subterfuge for rehousing poor minorities -urban internment camps for Black Americans. And of course, developers-builders got lucrative contracts, politicians got their kick-backs, and the poor got to live all together in new modern digs instead of the old and neglected neighborhoods. And as you know everyone lived happily ever after. God bless America.

[otnemarcaS]

I’m sure Heller will put a lot of forethought and perspective into what they are going to build at 20th and Capitol. It just might not be your Perspective, but we still believe in free enterprise in this country, and since he owns the lot and not you I think his perspective carries a little more weight than yours. But when the time comes to save a 1965 stucco one story apartment building in midtown you can provide all the historical perspective you want.



Well said. :tup:

[BrianSac]

Thanks, otnemarcaS :) :previous:

Quote below by Darn Good City
Sacramento would be better off if Preservationists had been able to stop the freeways from cutting off the waterfront and tearing down alot of the more spectacular Manhattan-like buildings that used to be there.

Thats why we should build the Deck over I-5. We can reclaim the waterfront and integrate it with downtown.

When were there ever Manhattan like buildings on the waterfront? Which Manhattan like buildings are you referring to?

[Darn Good City]

Thanks, otnemarcaS :) :previous:

Quote below by Darn Good City


Thats why we should build the Deck over I-5. We can reclaim the waterfront and integrate it with downtown.

When were there ever Manhattan like buildings on the waterfront? Which Manhattan like buildings are you referring to?


Not Manhattan-like high-rises, but Manhattan large mid-rises--ornate masonry. And not on the waterfront--those were always mostly docks, but around where the freeway is now. Built I believe after the flooding and fires. Check out the photos down at the State Archives!! They are simultaneously awesome and depressing.

And I can't believe the deck's scope has been reduced to 2 blocks from the original amount. Infeasable my ass. Lower I-5 more and/or get rid of the under-deck of parking in instances where there are clearance issues, and we would gain several more blocks.

[wburg]

There were quite a few buildings downtown that were considered high-rises in their day (but would be considered mid-rises by modern standards): 6-12 story buildings, office and residential, through the J and K Street area. Survivors include buildings like Cal-West/926 J and the Elks, the Travelers Hotel, the Ramona, the Fruit Building on 4th and J, the Forum Building, the Capitol Park Hotel, the Regis, or the Ochsner Building. Some of the ones that didn't make it:

http://sacramento.pastperfect-online.com/30528images/033/1961096019.jpg
Hotel Sacramento
http://sacramento.pastperfect-online.com/30528images/009/19700010120.jpg
Old Post Office
http://sacramento.pastperfect-online.com/30528images/045/19850242005.jpg
Western Hotel
http://sacramento.pastperfect-online.com/30528images/009/19700010076.jpg
Bank of Italy/Bank of America. The only still-standing building in this photo is the Hotel Berry in the distance.
http://sacramento.pastperfect-online.com/30528images/034/19630304.jpg
California National Bank
http://sacramento.pastperfect-online.com/30528images/052/19850244492.jpg
Grand Pavilion of the California State Fair

Now, these buildings weren't exactly Manhattan-like: by the 1880s-1920s when most of these went up, Manhattan was already a centuries-old, fully-developed city that grew up because it couldn't grow out, even though it started sprouting suburbs in the 1830s. Sacramento still had lots of room to grow, so things didn't get much taller than this. The waterfront was a workplace, not a place for tall buildings: the river was completely lined with freight docks, factories, warehouses, and three different railroads:
http://sacramento.pastperfect-online.com/30528images/009/19700010092.jpg
Front Street from about T Street
http://sacramento.pastperfect-online.com/30528images/016/1996X02017.jpg
This is where the Embassy Suites is now.

ozone: Two words. "K Street."

[ozone]

wburg:
Now there's a lot of worthy buildings you've shown us that I would have really fought to preserve -unlike the 1930 Capitol Ave.

OK what do you think the City's doing right now (in terms of K Street) that reminds you of the mistakes of the redevlopment/urban renewal of the past?

[innov8]

Saca's new downtown tower plan draws a familiar opponent
Sacramento Business Journal
Friday, June 27, 2008

http://sacramento.bizjournals.com/sacramento/stories/2008/06/30/tidbits1.html

John Saca is close to a green light for his comeback project as a high-rise developer — The Metropolitan tower on the northeast corner of 10th and J streets in downtown Sacramento.

The Sacramento Planning Commission approved the project last month. It’s proposed as a 40-story hotel/condominium with 190 units of each type, or as a 39-story tower with 320 condos, depending on which option makes sense when it comes time to start.

But a familiar face has raised objections: Davis attorney William Kopper, who represents three residents who formed a group called Sacramento Citizens for Downtown. Kopper has represented unions that opposed big projects when contracts with organized labor weren’t guaranteed. He sued last year over Sacramento’s approval of The Railyards, the redevelopment of the former Union Pacific site near downtown.

Kopper, who objected to an earlier version of the project, has appealed approval of The Metropolitan to the City Council, which will hear the matter July 15.

Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union Local 49 complained to the commission but did not appeal. “Basic questions remain unanswered about the hypothetical hotel at this site, such as — has the developer entered into a contract with a hotel management company?” the union asked in a letter. “Will it be a luxury property or a low-end economy lodge?”

Saca’s high-rise Towers on Capitol Mall project fell apart because of budget overruns. He said he’s concentrating on winning approval for The Metropolitan before working out financing details. He said he has no hotel operator in mind and would need city help to make that component work. “Maybe something similar to what was done with the Sheraton,” he said, referring to the city’s ownership participation in that hotel.

The city’s Design Commission must still review the project and will consider the condo/hotel version next month.

[wburg]

innov8: The focus of redevelopment efforts on K Street, over the past 50 years, is still based on "If we build new buildings, poor people will simply vanish." This didn't happen in the redevelopment era (promised replacement housing never appeared, so the people who lived in the hotels being demolished simply moved to the hotels a few blocks east, and the people sleeping on the streets on Second Street just moved their bedrolls in a similar manner) and it's not happening now.

Relocation of the bus station is an example: if you look at other cities, bus stations aren't a crime/homeless magnet if properly managed, but in Sacramento people simply assume that the bus station is the problem (talk about folks who need to look at other cities!) But what happens if we demolish the bus station and the street people fail to magically disappear?

[BrianSac]

innov8: The focus of redevelopment efforts on K Street, over the past 50 years, is still based on "If we build new buildings, poor people will simply vanish." This didn't happen in the redevelopment era (promised replacement housing never appeared, so the people who lived in the hotels being demolished simply moved to the hotels a few blocks east, and the people sleeping on the streets on Second Street just moved their bedrolls in a similar manner) and it's not happening now.

Relocation of the bus station is an example: if you look at other cities, bus stations aren't a crime/homeless magnet if properly managed, but in Sacramento people simply assume that the bus station is the problem (talk about folks who need to look at other cities!) But what happens if we demolish the bus station and the street people fail to magically disappear?

Kudos, on the historic pics above, I would have joined the picket line to save those buildings.

Also, I have mixed emotions about moving the bus station because it sits on the light rail line; how will those poor-homeless greyhound bus travelers connect with regional transit once we move the station out to Richards blvd?

I am also one of the few who actually likes the deco/streamline style of the Greyhound Bus Depot. We should adapt/save the first floor and make it a Jewish deli/new york/LA style coffee shop, but add 20-30 floors residences on top.

Most lively diverse cities have homeless types wandering the streets and nobody really cares. If high density housing ( mid to high end residences) is ever built downtown those wealthier-types wont really care about the poor-homeless types either, I dont think they will......they are pretty harmless.

[innov8]

innov8: The focus of redevelopment efforts on K Street, over the past 50 years, is still based on "If we build new buildings, poor people will simply vanish." This didn't happen in the redevelopment era (promised replacement housing never appeared, so the people who lived in the hotels being demolished simply moved to the hotels a few blocks east, and the people sleeping on the streets on Second Street just moved their bedrolls in a similar manner) and it's not happening now.

Relocation of the bus station is an example: if you look at other cities, bus stations aren't a crime/homeless magnet if properly managed, but in Sacramento people simply assume that the bus station is the problem (talk about folks who need to look at other cities!) But what happens if we demolish the bus station and the street people fail to magically disappear?

Uhhhh, that's great wberg, why are directing your comments at me? :rolleyes:

Since you feel that some how I need to be brought into this discussion...
the bus station can go, and I mean torn down. I don't see
any structural quality in the building worth saving. It's bland compared to other
structures of the same time period. Plus, it really doe's not matter what you or I
want done with the building cause we don't own it... so prepare yourself
to see a high-rise there when it's time to redevelope the lot.

[ltsmotorsport]

Hotel Sacramento was always one of my favorites that I saw in old pictures, but I'm really disappointed that the old BofA building is gone. Really sad. Do you have addresses for all those old buildings wburg?

As for the Metropolitan, I guess I shouldn't be surprised, but I don't think concerns about if the hotel would be economy or high end (in a high rise no less) is enough to delay a project like this.

[snfenoc]

I don't want to see the Greyhound Station moved because of the crowd it "attracts". As wburg said, those "evil" poor people will just pick up and move somewhere else. Besides, I took Greyhound down to SF a couple weekends ago (got a screamin' deal - better than driving and paying for parking at my hotel) and used light rail to travel to and from the station. Everything was very convenient. (Yes, I used the Greyhound station. Does that make me a "bum"?). I only want to see the station moved because the owner wants it to move. Yes, the prospect of a nice shiny tower is exciting, but Mr. Benvenuti's desire for his property is much more important to me. Besides, I'm not optimistic about a big project happening there any time soon. The site could sit vacant for a while (vacant lots certainly don't attract the "wrong" crowd - sarcasm). I will say I think it is wrong for the city to be involved. If Benvenuti can't find his own way to break the lease, then he's stuck - it's not a city issue (I must "sound" like a broken record).

The station does have a nice little urine-soaked, Streamline Moderne charm to it, but it's not something worth saving (in my opinion). I guess it's up to Benvenuti to decide what he wants to do with HIS property.

The Greyhound station and the building on 20th and Crapitol are not even in the same league as the buildings shown above. Perspective. I seriously doubt Sacramento will die with those "meh" pieces of architecture missing from the cityscape. "No, Steve, without those buildings in Sacramento, we will never learn from history and Hitler, Jr. will come to power again." Uh huh, when monkeys fly out of my butt. (I'm not saying there won't be a Hitler redux, I am saying it probably won't have anything to do with our Greyhound Station and the building on 20th and Crapitol.)




As a libertarian (a Republican who does drugs ;)), the following quote disturbs me:
Many folks here seem convinced that I want to save every old building. This isn't true! I think every old building deserves some consideration, to look at its role in the city's history (keeping in mind that we're a 150 year old city, not an ancient European city) and its present-day role. Sometimes, that means the building has to go--but they all deserve, at least, some consideration and investigation.


Uh, buildings deserve nothing. They are buildings. They have no rights. Only humans have rights. There is no need to get so emotionally attached - a little perspective please.

(BROKEN RECORD ALERT!!!!!) Also, you seem to be saying all old buildings should go through an approval process (government-controlled and controlled by biased history buffs, no doubt) before they are destroyed or even modified. (I am aware this process, in some form or another, already exists.) This is America. I don't hafta do that if I don't wanna. My property is MY property - not yours. ;) :P

[wburg]

itsmotorsport:
Hotel Sacramento was where the Woolworth's/Cosmo Theater is now.
Old Post Office: Where St. Rose of Lima Park is now (the skating rink.)
Western Hotel: K and 5th.
Bank of America: 8th and J.
California National: 4th and J, where the Wong Center is now.
Pavilion: 15th and Capitol, where the rose garden is now.

[innov8]

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a132/mz1613/500CM/2500cm2008-06-26.jpg

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a132/mz1613/500CM/33500cm2008-06-27.jpg

A few more shots from the top of 500 Capitol Mall here: http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=116260&page=21

[econgrad]

As a libertarian (a Republican who does drugs ;)),

:lmao:

[midtownup]

I’m sure Heller will put a lot of forethought and perspective into what they are going to build at 20th and Capitol. It just might not be your Perspective, but we still believe in free enterprise in this country, and since he owns the lot and not you I think his perspective carries a little more weight than yours. But when the time comes to save a 1965 stucco one story apartment building in midtown you can provide all the historical perspective you want.



Very well said.

The bottom line here is money. I would take steps to protect my investment as well. It's just common sense. Development isn't about preserving. Preserving is just a bonus when it can be done while still turning a profit.

We have enterprising movers and shakers doing something "constructive" with not only this city but also their lives. Building buildings and a legacy at the same time. These people wake up in the morning with a sense of urgency to make a mark and do something worthwhile with their time on this earth. These people are building venues for the economy to thrive, creating jobs in construction, retail and housing just to name a handful. We have to keep moving forward and reinvent ourselves every day to adapt.

Of course these people are fundamentally different from those who "hinder development". The likes of which spend endless amount of time trying to change and control their environment instead of being the environment that others try to control. The amount of redundant historical "well read" banter is not a bad thing but just shows what the other side of the coin concerns themselves with and lives to postulate. "Poo poo-ing" others and trying to sound smart and look good while doing it might be what makes these people happy instead of building buildings, making money or transforming this city.

That being said:

a) The building at 20th and Capitol was a joke. Glad it's gone. Midtown is a goldmine of bulldoze-able parcels and this is just the start. The transformation currently taking shape in midtown is just the tip of the iceberg.

b) Although arguing over semantics on a forum which holds, for the most part, a completely different point of view and clogging every section may pass the time or provide a venue for releasing creative/intellectual steam- it has become quite disruptive. I don't think many of us are going to proclaim: "thank GOODNESS for the light! I never saw it that way! Thank GOODNESS for the incredible all knowing historical figure, I don't know what I would have done with my limited knowledge and lack of facts". As a trained debater I can reassure you these arguments will never end and continue to clog the forums as there is no such thing as the perfect argument-for or against.

c) Preservationists fail to recognize that maybe the original builders of mediocre "historical" buildings turn in their graves when people try to preserve them. What if their original intent was never to create a historical building but to make some money at the time? I'm sure they would be in favor of progress and re-building. I can reassure you preservationists didn't build historical buildings. Builders did. Just to be clear, when I refer to historical buildings I am strictly speaking of those hardly historical rickety structures downtown / midtown Sacramento, not actual historical buildings.

d) Utopian views about what is best for "the most of us" regarding what should not be built midtown is grossly negligent and incredibly ill suited when many people live in the area BECAUSE of the transformation taking place. Myself included. These views and sometimes actions against development are incredibly sicking especially when these views physically stand in the way of a developer's right to proposer. I like new things being built. I am excited about the next new development. That is why I visit the forum (lurking til now) and live in midtown. This last and final point begs the question: if you are fighting to preserve a certain building which no one really cares to preserve- who are you preserving the building for? At least in this forum, the pretense that others share the same view is false.

cheers!

[wburg]

midtownup: If I only wanted to hear from people who agreed with me, do you really think I'd be posting here? I'm not here for accolades, and as you have no doubt seen if you have been lurking for a while, I certainly don't receive many.

I'm here to learn, as well as share information about ongoing development--and to learn from people whose ideas don't match my own. But I don't always disagree with those on here--there are plenty of projects I like, and publicly support. In a lot of ways, I'm just another development buff.

I'm just expressing my opinion, that's all, even if others don't necessarily agree with it.

[Grimnebulin]

midtownup: If I only wanted to hear from people who agreed with me, do you really think I'd be posting here? I'm not here for accolades, and as you have no doubt seen if you have been lurking for a while, I certainly don't receive many.

I'm here to learn, as well as share information about ongoing development--and to learn from people whose ideas don't match my own. But I don't always disagree with those on here--there are plenty of projects I like, and publicly support. In a lot of ways, I'm just another development buff.

I'm just expressing my opinion, that's all, even if others don't necessarily agree with it.

wburg - Even though I sometimes disagree with your viewpoints on some preservation issues, I'm definitely glad you're here to present a different opinion as it tends to make me reassess my own opinions in a more critical manner. :tup:

[otnemarcaS]

Agree too. The forum is here to share similar or differing views on various developments affecting Sacramento. It is great to have wburg here because he certainly provides a differing perspective on preservation and other issues regardless of how many people disagree (or agree) with him. I mean, I completely agree if he wanted to save the buildings in the archive photos he posted (#3308), but wonder if he's gone cuckoo for cocoa puffs when he feels that the "Rex/Auto" building at 20th and Capitol is even worth saving.

[wburg]

Look, I liked the building. I'll miss it. The demo seemed a little hinky to me. Apparently, some think the fact that I liked the building and thought things were hinky will bring all development in Sacramento to a screeching halt forever, and destroy the American way of life utterly.

Personally, I doubt it.

Can we officially drop it and move on?

[econgrad]

midtownup: If I only wanted to hear from people who agreed with me, do you really think I'd be posting here? I'm not here for accolades, and as you have no doubt seen if you have been lurking for a while, I certainly don't receive many.

I'm here to learn, as well as share information about ongoing development--and to learn from people whose ideas don't match my own. But I don't always disagree with those on here--there are plenty of projects I like, and publicly support. In a lot of ways, I'm just another development buff.

I'm just expressing my opinion, that's all, even if others don't necessarily agree with it.

Same here... :tup:
Without our debates, I would be bored on this forum.

[Majin]

Actually without me this forum would be boring.

[Fusey]

Well, you did start a cult that is currently stalking us on sacbee.com.

[Majin]

:)

[jsf8278]

Well, you did start a cult that is currently stalking us on sacbee.com.

Speaking of...I was just reading a Sacbee.com article about a Gavin Newsom run for governor when I read the comment bellow. Not only do you guys have stalkers, but you have stalkers that post comments that can't possibly be construed as a rational thought...not a good combo!

SkyscrapersForever at 8:45 PM PST Tuesday, July 1, 2008 said:
I'll be voting AGAINST Newsom. According to Majin, only Sacramentans can run for governor. That way all of these crappy old buildings can be demolished and replaced with skyscrapers shipped from Tokyo.

[Majin]

Damn that is hella crazy, he remembers every little thing I say. I think I am a god to him.

BTW that guy is right, if Newsom runs for Governor I will be voting against him and I expect everyone on this forum to do the same. There no way in hell we shoud let anyone from San Francisco run the state.

[creamcityleo79]

Damn that is hella crazy, he remembers every little thing I say. I think I am a god to him.

BTW that guy is right, if Newsom runs for Governor I will be voting against him and I expect everyone on this forum to do the same. There no way in hell we shoud let anyone from San Francisco run the state.
I'd vote for him! That is, unless it was Villaraigosa running against him. Then, I'd have a tough time choosing between the two! Besides, what Sacramento politician are you REALLY going to vote for for governor? Darrell Steinberg? Fat chance he's even going to run. He likes his new seat as Senate President too much! So, we're left with people like Roger Dickinson (:yuck:) and Heather Fargo...HARDLY what I'd call a great candidate pool. So, yes, I will be doing what is best for California and voting for a good liberal mayor from either San Francisco or Los Angeles if they're running!

[Fusey]

Besides, what Sacramento politician are you REALLY going to vote for for governor?

Dan Lungren ran 10 years ago. :haha:

So far I hate all of our options. This state has a love to vote for people who bankrupt us.

[Majin]

I rather vote for Fargo out of principal.

[wburg]

There's a rumor that Jerry Brown might run for governor again...now that would be interesting! And it's fair to say that he at least lived here for a while, and his parents did too!

[Pistola916]

There's a rumor that Jerry Brown might run for governor again...now that would be interesting! And it's fair to say that he at least lived here for a while, and his parents did too!

Again.. you can do that??

[wburg]

Again.. you can do that??
Term limits weren't in place when Brown was governor, so they don't apply to those terms.

[Michael Kramer]

I'd vote for him! That is, unless it was Villaraigosa running against him. Then, I'd have a tough time choosing between the two! Besides, what Sacramento politician are you REALLY going to vote for for governor? Darrell Steinberg? Fat chance he's even going to run. He likes his new seat as Senate President too much! So, we're left with people like Roger Dickinson (:yuck:) and Heather Fargo...HARDLY what I'd call a great candidate pool. So, yes, I will be doing what is best for California and voting for a good liberal mayor from either San Francisco or Los Angeles if they're running!


I'll take Newsom over Villaraigosa. The mayor down here seems to spend more time with photo ops than anything else. Of course I could blame our shallow media.:slob:

Michael
Los Angeles

formerly of

San Francisco 2000-2005
Sacramento 1983-2000
San Mateo Co. 1964-1983

[BrianSac]

Downtown's projects rise in face of downturn
Hotels, offices, lofts in Sacramento's core are staying on track.
By Mary Lynne Vellinga - mlvellinga@sacbee.com
Published 12:00 am PDT Friday, July 4, 2008

Standing at the corner of 10th and K streets, in the heart of downtown Sacramento, there's little sign of the real estate free fall slamming the suburbs.

On one corner, dust rises from the construction site of a musical theater, restaurant and bar complex – The Cosmopolitan – scheduled to open in September in a former Woolworth's store. Across the street, crews are renovating another old department store into "office condos."

Corner by corner, the gradual metamorphosis of Sacramento's core continues to unfold, much as it has for the past decade.

"We're just percolating right along," said Leslie Fritzsche, city downtown development manager.

While developers predict activity will slow, they say it's unlikely to stop. Various forces are combining to keep the construction crews working.

Concern about traffic and global warming, combined with gas priced at nearly $5 a gallon, is driving interest in downtown, developers say.

"The region, along with the country as a whole, is starting to rethink how far away they want to be from the different destinations in their lives, with the goal of ideally living and working and playing in a more central kind of region," said Ellen Warner, a partner in David S. Taylor Interests, a prolific downtown developer.

The suburban lifestyle isn't about to disappear, but over time the central city will become an increasingly attractive option, agreed home industry consultant Greg Paquin, president of the Gregory Group in Folsom.

The growing collection of restaurants, shops and entertainment venues will create a draw of its own, he said. "It's going to be all this synergy."

Walkable projects sought

Public spending also plays a role. Increasingly, government at all levels is steering money to the central city – trying to foster transit-friendly, walkable places.

Millions of dollars in state and local funds will slosh into downtown in the next few years. It comes from property taxes captured by the Sacramento Housing and Redevelopment Agency and voter-approved state housing and transportation bonds.

Stan Thomas, developer of the Sacramento railyard, will get $47 million this year in state housing bond money to build streets into his proposed development.

Township 9, a planned development of 2,350 housing units in the Richards Boulevard area, is earmarked for $19.1 million. Another $23 million is destined for the Triangle area on the West Sacramento riverfront, which is approved for as many as 5,000 housing units and 2 million square feet of office space.

Downtown isn't immune to market forces. Projects opening now were mostly started during the real estate boom – and were too far along to stop when the bottom fell out. Housing has been particularly hard hit.

Downtown developers say they've had to heavily discount their product to move it, and they're making little, if any, profit these days.

"This is a depression in real estate; everybody who was really flying high isn't anymore," said developer Mark Friedman, who has sold 12 of his 26 Sutter Brownstones in midtown.

Friedman – whose family also owns Arden Fair mall – said urban developers are in better shape than those who placed all their bets on continued growth on the suburban edge.

Growth at moderate pace

Unlike the suburbs, downtown and midtown didn't experience a boom in housing in the past decade. They grew, but at a relatively modest pace, while the suburbs sprouted thousands of housing units every year.

Today, that slower growth has become an advantage: The central city isn't burdened with an enormous inventory of unsold or unrented properties.

"I'd much rather have my risk position be in downtown or midtown Sacramento than in the outlying suburbs," said developer Mike Heller, a partner of Friedman's whose portfolio includes downtown and suburban offices.

While huge condo towers touted for downtown didn't survive the market slump, other housing, office and entertainment venues did.

• At 10th and J, a 1920s, Beaux Arts office building will reopen as the Citizen Hotel, the city's first high-rise boutique hotel.

• David Taylor's new U.S. Bank Tower on Capitol Mall features a nighttime LED projection display of a flowing river across its 80-foot-tall, louvered top. Another office tower is going up across the street.

• The former Firestone tire dealership at 16th and L will reopen this fall as The Firestone – a complex with a Fleming's Prime Steakhouse, a California Pizza Kitchen, DeVere's Irish Pub and an upstairs lounge operated by the family that runs Mason's, Ma Jong's and The Ultra Lounge.

• The owner of the Firehouse restaurant in Old Sacramento is nearing completion on a replica of the Gold Rush-era Orleans Hotel. The five-story building has 24 loft-style apartments and a restaurant and retail space downstairs.

• On Sept. 26, The Cosmopolitan will debut with a party and opening of "Forever Plaid," a show staged by the California Musical Theatre, in the new, Cosmopolitan Cabaret. Restaurateur Randy Paragary will run a deli-inspired restaurant, Cosmo's, in the downstairs, and a Las Vegas-style nightclub with a rooftop patio overlooking K Street.

• Heller just converted an old Travelodge motel at 11th and H streets into Retrolodge, a complex of 50 tiny offices renting for about $600 to $1,500 a month. The two buildings are decorated in a 1950s style and named Elroy and Astro after the cartoon TV show "The Jetsons."

Even as these projects get finished, there are signs that some of downtown's tougher spots are about to get some attention.

K Street's ample collection of run-down buildings attracted the notice of Napa's Trancas Ventures, which renovated the former Roos Atkins department store at 10th and K streets into "office condos" and has bought other buildings nearby. The firm is negotiating to buy the Crest Theatre, and has been talking to the city about renovating into a hotel a closed bank at 10th and K.

"We've always made it a practice of finding buildings nobody wants and creating buildings everybody wants," said Trancas adviser Jim Brennan.

Shopping mall giant Westfield says it will start construction by early next year on a long-awaited face-lift for Downtown Plaza.

"I'm really encouraged," Fritzsche said. "They have indicated they want to move their construction crews from work they're doing in Roseville straight down to do work on Downtown Plaza."

http://media.sacbee.com/smedia/2008/07/03/20/92-5M4DOWNTOWN.xlgraphic.prod_affiliate.4.gif

[SacUrbnPlnr]

Bob Shallit: Condos may top new B Street Theatre center
By Bob Shallit - bshallit@sacbee.com
Published 12:00 am PDT Saturday, July 5, 2008
Story appeared in BUSINESS section, Page D2

An architect's rendering shows five floors of residential condominium units proposed to be built atop the new B Street Theatre complex at 27th Street and Capitol Avenue in midtown Sacramento. The condos would help subsidize about $15 million of the theater construction.
Ankrom Moisan / Associated Architects

http://media.sacbee.com/smedia/2008/07/04/15/555-6B5SHALLIT.standalone.prod_affiliate.4.JPG

There's a surprise second act in the works for the B Street Theatre's new midtown performance center: About 100 residential condo units could go atop the theater's proposed complex at 27th Street and Capitol Avenue.

The condos would help subsidize construction of the theater, slashing B Street's costs from at least $25 million to about $10 million, says Bill Blake, the company's managing director.

"It would fund a large portion of the building," Blake says of the five-story condo addition.

He credits housing developer Sotiris Kolokotronis – a longtime B Street backer – with the idea of topping the theater complex with condos.

The building's original plan called for a so-called "fly tower" at one end to accommodate theater backdrops and sets that must be raised and lowered during scenery changes.

Now, the plan is for a boxier look. But, Blake insists, "it's a really nice box," designed by Portland architecture firm Ankrom Moisan, which also worked on Kolokotronis' L Street Lofts project at 18th and L streets.

The goal is to complete the project – part of Sutter Medical Center's $600 million complex of hospital facilities, parking, housing and retail services – in 2012.

Condo prices would range from the mid-$300,000s to more than $1 million – similar to the L Street Lofts. But this project would be built on a not-for-profit basis; once construction costs are paid off, all condo profits would fund theater operations, Kolokotronis says.

The plans – submitted to Sacramento city planners this week – call for a two-story glassed-in lobby, with a coffee shop on the first floor and a second-floor bistro serving theater-goers, condo owners and the surrounding community.

The public lobby fits in with what Blake says is B Street's mission: To be "a populist theater that's embedded in the community … a place where everybody is welcome to hang out."

[L8 4 Tahoe]

• The former Firestone tire dealership at 16th and L will reopen this fall as The Firestone – a complex with a Fleming's Prime Steakhouse, a California Pizza Kitchen, DeVere's Irish Pub and an upstairs lounge operated by the family that runs Mason's, Ma Jong's and The Ultra Lounge.


I thought I read somewhere that Flemings pulled from the building. :shrug: Maybe on here....

[arod74]

I thought I read somewhere that Flemings pulled from the building. :shrug: Maybe on here....

Yeah it was posted not too long ago. I would take the information posted here over the Bee article based on the amount of errors they have reported over the years concerning other various projects. Though Fleming's is a nice joint, I wouldn't be too heartbroken about losing a steakhouse. There seems to be plenty in town and something a little more exotic would be nice..

[Darn Good City]

The B Street Theatre building is absolutely awesome. Very good move to add residential units on top. People moving up and down the large spiral stair at the glass corner will add alot of visual movement.

[arod74]

I agree, B Street condo center would be a nice score if it went in over what the current plan is. Would seem to be a win-win so keeping fingers crossed.

[quevinh]

Yeah it was posted not too long ago. I would take the information posted here over the Bee article based on the amount of errors they have reported over the years concerning other various projects. Though Fleming's is a nice joint, I wouldn't be too heartbroken about losing a steakhouse. There seems to be plenty in town and something a little more exotic would be nice..


I agree 100%. Although I love steak, we have more than enough steak joints in this town. Once a cow (or steer) has been killed and cut up, how hard is it to throw the thing on some flame and eat it? Give me Waterboy anyday, I'll stick with my Weber.

[BrianSac]

I agree 100%. Although I love steak, we have more than enough steak joints in this town. Once a cow (or steer) has been killed and cut up, how hard is it to throw the thing on some flame and eat it? Give me Waterboy anyday, I'll stick with my Weber.

I feel the same way about Steak, might as well make that at home. Waterboy is also my favorite in town.

[enigma99a]

yeah I agree. And waterboy (my favorite place in Sac) does have steak as well :)

[L8 4 Tahoe]

Front page of the Wall Street Journal today Original link (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121538754733231043.html?mod=todays_us_nonsub_page_one) (includes some cool graphics and some video)
With Gas Over $4, Cities Explore
Whether It's Smart to Be Dense
Sacramento's 'Blueprint' for Growth
Draws National Attention
By ANA CAMPOY
July 7, 2008; Page A1

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Gasoline was less than $2 a gallon when Mike McKeever brought his gospel of bikes, light rail and tightly packed neighborhoods to this state synonymous with cars, freeways and suburban sprawl.

"The development industry was very concerned," says Mr. McKeever, head of Sacramento's regional planning agency. "The environmental community was openly negative," concerned that it was "just more talk, talk."
[planning]
Sacramento Area Council of Governments, Urban Advantage
Sacramento officials used photo imagery to show how different parts of the city could be brought in line with their pedestrian-friendly vision. See how things could change.

Seven years later, with gasoline hurtling past $4 a gallon, Sacramento has become one of the nation's most-watched experiments in whether urban planning can help solve everything from high fuel prices to the housing bust to global warming.

"They're really the model," says Steve Winkelman, a transportation expert at the Center for Clean Air Policy.

For decades, backers of "smart-growth" planning principles have preached the benefit of clustering the places where people live more closely with the businesses where they work and shop. Less travel would mean less fuel consumption and less air pollution. Several communities built from scratch upon those principles, such as Celebration in Florida, sprouted across the country. But they were often isolated experiments, connected to their surroundings mainly by car. So, as gasoline remained cheap, the rest of the country continued its inexorable march toward bigger houses and longer commutes.

Now, smart-growth fans see a chance to reverse that.

"Expensive oil is going to transform the American culture as radically as cheap oil did," predicts David Mogavero, a Sacramento-based architect and smart-growth proponent.
Over the past 50 years, cheap gasoline has encouraged developers to build communities further and further away from city cores. Now, city planners are experimenting with "smart growth" that keeps work and shopping close to home.

Sacramento -- yoked to the car and mired in one of the lousiest housing markets in the country -- offers an intriguing laboratory for that idea. Four years ago, just as oil was gaining momentum in its torrid climb to $140 a barrel and beyond, the six-county region adopted a plan for growth through 2050 that roped off some areas from development while concentrating growth more densely in others, emphasizing keeping jobs near homes.

The local governments in the area aren't compelled to follow the so-called Blueprint, but the plan -- backed by a strange-bedfellows coalition of ordinary citizens, politicians, developers and environmentalists -- shows signs of working, nonetheless.

"To me, the simplest way to test whether local governments are mainstreaming Blueprint growth principles is to look at...what is getting built," says Mr. McKeever. "The evidence there is pretty clear."

Between 2004 and 2007, the number of projects with apartments, condominiums and town houses for sale in the region increased by 533%, while the number of subdivisions with homes on lots bigger than 5,500 square feet fell by 21%, according to housing-research firm Hanley Wood Market Intelligence.

Things were different during the 1990s, as new single-family homes crept out to fill the abundant open spaces far from downtown. Traffic exploded, rising 66% from 1990 to 2003. In 2000, the American Lung Association ranked Sacramento 11th for the worst air pollution among U.S. cities -- though, with about 1.4 million people, it was 28th in population.
[Drive Time]

Facing the threat of losing its federal transportation funding because of its poor air quality, the Sacramento Area Council of Governments hired Mr. McKeever in 2001 to lead the region's cleanup effort. He brought with him an eclectic environmental résumé: He'd run a business that used a door-size fan to test homes for leaks of precious heated or cooled air; he'd become an expert in siting houses so they got the most sun possible, saving on electricity; and he'd become a planning consultant, helping Portland, Ore., create a walking city with compact neighborhoods connected by buses, streetcars and light rail.

When Mr. McKeever arrived in California, gasoline was relatively cheap and developers comfortable in building subdivisions the way they always had. He knew he would need to be able to paint a detailed, realistic picture of what life in the area would be like in 2050 if the traditional pattern of plopping one house on one acre of ground far from the owners' jobs continued.

Buildings' Impact

His staff collected information on all 750,000 pieces of property in the region, such as the number of housing units, people employed there, and return-on-investment rates generated by various building projects. They plugged those numbers into a database to be used with computer software Mr. McKeever helped develop to calculate the impact different kinds of buildings have on traffic, job growth and pollution.

In 2003, he took the computer model on the road to workshop after workshop. This wasn't the typical public hearing where officials sit in a row and take questions from the crowd. Instead, the more than 5,000 people who attended got a chance to use the computer program to play planner for a day, tweaking the mix of buildings to see what would happen.

"It sounds hokey," says the typically earnest Mr. McKeever, "but it's about making democracy work."

Wary Developers

Developers were wary. The higher density was tantalizing, but they weren't sure how to get financing and permits, how to build and market the new communities.

"My first big policy direction was, 'You need to go stop this Blueprint thing at all costs,'" recalls Dennis Rogers, a lobbyist with the North State Building Industry Association.

Mr. McKeever persevered. He conducted shuttle diplomacy of sorts, gliding between meetings with developers and environmentalists in a golf-cart-like neighborhood electric vehicle.
[Go to graphic]

Gradually, the builders began to accept Mr. McKeever's argument that adding town houses, condos and apartments to the mix of single-family homes would expose them to more markets and protect them from a downturn in any particular one. At the same time, residents were becoming more open to alternatives to the typical suburban house thanks to what they were learning at the workshops.

"The building industry is one of the most customer-driven that you can find," says Marcus Lo Duca, a lawyer who has represented builders for 20 years. "You have to adjust what you do to meet what home buyers want."

Dave Morris, an area developer, became a convert when he attended a workshop where officials presented their forecast of what the region would look like in 50 years if it kept growing in the same way. On a big screen in front of hundreds of people, they flashed traffic and air-quality figures that showed "you would commute faster on a bicycle," says Mr. Morris. The quality of life for communities without jobs nearby would nose dive.

"It was really an eye-opener," says Mr. Morris, 60 years old.

At the time, he was building two gated communities with single-family homes on one-acre lots. Mr. Morris is now working on a 171-loft project that will include shops and offices in downtown Woodland, a small city northwest of Sacramento near the university town of Davis. The site is near a courthouse, one of the main employers in town, as well as restaurants and coffee shops. It has access to public transit that can take residents to downtown Sacramento. The public library is just a few blocks away.

"I see gas prices making people take the Blueprint seriously," he says. "It's kind of like not worrying about fast food till the doctor tells you that you have a bad heart."

No. 1 Concern

A poll earlier this year by California State University, Sacramento, found that high gasoline prices were the No. 1 concern in the area and that 12% of respondents had changed jobs or moved in the past year to shorten their commute to work.

Matt Overmyer moved to a new compact development in Roseville, a city northeast of Sacramento. It now takes him 15 minutes to get to his job as a manager of a Lowe's home-improvement store, compared with the 45 minutes he drove from Folsom, a nearby town he describes as "suburbia at its finest."

Mr. Overmyer's new neighborhood sits at the western-most edge of Roseville, where cattle grazed not long ago. But unlike many of the typical suburban developments that sprouted on farmland surrounding Sacramento in previous years, his is designed around a "village square" with restaurants and shops. Once it's built out, it will be just a couple of blocks away from Mr. Overmyer's home. A school, which his 19-month-old daughter will attend once she's old enough, has already been built less than half a mile away.

Mr. Overmyer, 30 years old, now bikes to the grocery store, something he never did in Folsom. Because the houses in his new neighborhood are close together and share a back alley, he also interacts a lot more with his neighbors.

"My social life now consists of four neighbors up and down the street," he says. Before, he and his wife had to drive at least a few miles to see friends.

Mr. Overmyer says he's enjoying spending less time behind the wheel and "the bigger sense of community." He's also pleased to see that the houses around him are already selling for more than what he paid for his last year.

While the Blueprint is still only a guide and local governments have the final word on development, many have begun incorporating its principles into their local laws, giving them real teeth.

In Rancho Cordova, a city east of Sacramento that has adopted a Blueprint-friendly development plan, residents in densely packed town homes and small houses can walk to work at nearby office parks. The light-rail line built to commute to Sacramento now serves as a tram for local residents.

"We're a suburb that wants to become a city," says Linda Budge, Rancho's mayor.

In the spring, the regional-planning agency's board took another major step by approving a $42 billion transportation plan designed to mesh with the Blueprint. Together, both are projected by 2035 to reduce the amount of driving per household by 8% and global-warming emissions per household by 12% from their 2005 levels.

Now, California's Transportation Department is offering grants to help other areas in the state create their own Blueprints. Two environmental groups have co-sponsored a bill in the state legislature encouraging other areas to follow Sacramento's example. Think tanks such as the Center for Clean Air Policy are lobbying to include Blueprint methods in the federal transportation bill, which is up for reauthorization next year.

Placer Vineyards

But Mr. McKeever, who became his agency's director in 2004, still has battles to fight every day. Take, for example, Placer Vineyards, a 14,132-unit proposed housing development. It's in a good Blueprint location, close to both Sacramento and the city of Roseville, a big job center. But the proposal doesn't meet the Blueprint standard of an average 10 housing units per acre, which would translate into a 21,631-unit project. That's the necessary density to accommodate its projected future population growth within the Blueprint's boundaries.

"If you don't build those 7,000 units there," Mr. McKeever says, "they will go somewhere else," potentially onto land that the plan called for remaining undeveloped.
[photo]
SACOG
Mike McKeever, of the Sacramento Area Council of Governments

Mr. McKeever negotiated with the project's developers to present two plans to the Placer County Board of Supervisors for approval -- the original plan, and the Blueprint version. But the board chose the developer's less-dense, original plan. "I felt like they were pushing those 7,000 units on me," says county Supervisor F.C. "Rocky" Rockholm.

Mr. Rockholm, one of the 32 government officials who sit on the regional planning board, voted for the Blueprint, but he argues that the denser version is wrong for the site, now just farmland dotted with cows and yellow mustard flowers. Area residents were concerned about the traffic the denser development would generate. Aside from the density issue, Mr. Rockholm says, Placer Vineyards will be Blueprint-compliant, with a bus transit center and trails and bike paths connecting homes to parks and schools, he says.

But without density, counters Terry Davis of the area Sierra Club chapter, smart growth doesn't work. His group joined the local Audubon Society to file a lawsuit against Placer County and the developers, charging them with destroying natural land with plans that "unnecessarily promote urban sprawl." The parties are in settlement talks.

Plans for Streetcar

Even projects that fully comply with the Blueprint have their problems. Mark Friedman, a local developer, is working on a mixed-use development across the Sacramento River from the California State Capitol, the heart of downtown. In his loftlike office, a retrofitted former Pontiac-dealership, Mr. Friedman points to a sleek architectural model to show how a streetcar would connect apartments, office buildings and retail, making cars unnecessary.

Except that without building housing first, there won't be enough people to justify the state and local money that will help finance a streetcar. And without the streetcar, the carless project doesn't work. "It's a chicken-and-egg situation," says Mr. Friedman.

Building in the heart of the city costs more than creating subdivisions in empty land on city outskirts, says Mr. Friedman. But with the rising price of gasoline driving up the cost of commuting, he and other developers are finding healthy demand for their city projects at a time when suburban sales are slumping.

Even though the area's housing market has been wracked by price drops of 25% in the last year and one of the highest foreclosure rates in the country, Mr. Friedman says he already has sold nine of 28 town houses near downtown that he recently completed, and three more are under contract, "which is not bad considering the dismal state of the Sacramento real-estate market."

Mr. Morris, the developer, says the housing downturn is hurting the places that have the "dumbest growth. Smart growth works when the rest of it doesn't."

Write to Ana Campoy at ana.campoy@dowjones.com

[Darn Good City]

Very well said.

The bottom line here is money. I would take steps to protect my investment as well. It's just common sense. Development isn't about preserving. Preserving is just a bonus when it can be done while still turning a profit.

We have enterprising movers and shakers doing something "constructive" with not only this city but also their lives. Building buildings and a legacy at the same time. These people wake up in the morning with a sense of urgency to make a mark and do something worthwhile with their time on this earth. These people are building venues for the economy to thrive, creating jobs in construction, retail and housing just to name a handful. We have to keep moving forward and reinvent ourselves every day to adapt.

Of course these people are fundamentally different from those who "hinder development". The likes of which spend endless amount of time trying to change and control their environment instead of being the environment that others try to control. The amount of redundant historical "well read" banter is not a bad thing but just shows what the other side of the coin concerns themselves with and lives to postulate. "Poo poo-ing" others and trying to sound smart and look good while doing it might be what makes these people happy instead of building buildings, making money or transforming this city.

That being said:

a) The building at 20th and Capitol was a joke. Glad it's gone. Midtown is a goldmine of bulldoze-able parcels and this is just the start. The transformation currently taking shape in midtown is just the tip of the iceberg.

b) Although arguing over semantics on a forum which holds, for the most part, a completely different point of view and clogging every section may pass the time or provide a venue for releasing creative/intellectual steam- it has become quite disruptive. I don't think many of us are going to proclaim: "thank GOODNESS for the light! I never saw it that way! Thank GOODNESS for the incredible all knowing historical figure, I don't know what I would have done with my limited knowledge and lack of facts". As a trained debater I can reassure you these arguments will never end and continue to clog the forums as there is no such thing as the perfect argument-for or against.

c) Preservationists fail to recognize that maybe the original builders of mediocre "historical" buildings turn in their graves when people try to preserve them. What if their original intent was never to create a historical building but to make some money at the time? I'm sure they would be in favor of progress and re-building. I can reassure you preservationists didn't build historical buildings. Builders did. Just to be clear, when I refer to historical buildings I am strictly speaking of those hardly historical rickety structures downtown / midtown Sacramento, not actual historical buildings.

d) Utopian views about what is best for "the most of us" regarding what should not be built midtown is grossly negligent and incredibly ill suited when many people live in the area BECAUSE of the transformation taking place. Myself included. These views and sometimes actions against development are incredibly sicking especially when these views physically stand in the way of a developer's right to proposer. I like new things being built. I am excited about the next new development. That is why I visit the forum (lurking til now) and live in midtown. This last and final point begs the question: if you are fighting to preserve a certain building which no one really cares to preserve- who are you preserving the building for? At least in this forum, the pretense that others share the same view is false.

cheers!



I just read your post, so I thought I'd chime in since unfortunately not alot is going on in new construction. First, welcome to the forum. The point about preserving buildings that "no one really cares about" is flawed logic. Obviously the person fighting to save the building is the one who cares about it, and they are fighting for their own sense of what is important. If we as a society continued to only leave standing and build buildings that the majority wanted, we would end up with a boring homogeny--constantly culling the oddballs creates a middle of the road result--the building equivalent of only watching American Idol. If you don't have the super modern strange buildings because "no one cares about them" and you don't have the strange old homely little buildings because "no one cares about them", you get a mediocre short spectrum of middle of the road buildings. I prefer interesting variety. I would prefer the building equivalent of a corny Film Noir next to A Clockwork Orange next to a Honeymooner's rerun next to The Jerk next to an Animation Festival. Is any of these an example of the best in their genre? Maybe not, but if you took out maybe the Honeymooners and the corny Film Noir and replaced them with a whole season of Friends, would you necessarily have a more interesting block? Maybe while Friends was popular. What everyone thinks is a good building today may not be what everyone thinks is a good building tomorrow. Styles change. As a city we will do better to have a diversified portfolio of building stock than to sell a large portion of one type of stock and buy a whole bunch of what's hot now. Maybe the hot trend will be weird old wood buildings in the future. Who would have thought in the 30's that auto garages downtown would house some of the trendiest restaurants in Sacramento today? The problem is, if we sell our old stock, we can never buy it back in the future if it starts to be popular again. I mean even the ones that "aren't worth preserving" in our current definition of "worth preserving". Obviously, popular opinion of everything that has been demolished in Sacramento at the time it was demolished was that it "wasn't worth preserving". The thing that's great about Sacramento is, to continue with the stock portfolio analogy, we don't have sell off most of the one to get the other--we have so many wasted empty lots and surface parking lots and the railyards. We should be building high and dense on these, and we don't have to sacrifice so much of the diversity to current tastes. If we both sell off a chunk of the old and buy only the new, the old becomes a smaller and smaller ratio of our holdings, and we lose our portfolio's diversity, which is what keeps us a healthy desirable city through changing fads. We can always build an unlimited amount of new, and we can never build even one single old thing. We need radical buildings--very tall and very modern and very unusual--and part of what is hot now. At the same time---we need Perspective! Perspective that times and styles and fads change. To get rid of what is not hot now for what is hot now lacks Perspective.

Your description of "developers" is far too simplified. Some developers have great vision and build really great things and leave a legacy. Some developers have no vision, bad taste, and/or build really bad projects that actually harm the evolution of the city, and it isn't because Preservationists stopped them from doing an amazing project---its because some developers just don't care about building anything great; they are just doing a job. Of course, as has been said many times on this board --its their land which they just chose to buy with an old building on it and they can do what they want and further if they can afford to buy up every piece of property in a 4 block area in Downtown, they can do what they want with it, including leveling all of the highrises that block their view of the Capitol from their office, and no one nearby gets to complain about their own property values going down as a result because developers can do what they want with the property they buy. (Yes, I just presented an ironic exaggeration based on an extrapolation.) But what are we discussing on this forum if we only discuss the projects we are personally developing. The boards would probably get pretty quiet.

[Darn Good City]

Very well said.

The bottom line here is money. I would take steps to protect my investment as well. It's just common sense. Development isn't about preserving. Preserving is just a bonus when it can be done while still turning a profit.

We have enterprising movers and shakers doing something "constructive" with not only this city but also their lives. Building buildings and a legacy at the same time. These people wake up in the morning with a sense of urgency to make a mark and do something worthwhile with their time on this earth. These people are building venues for the economy to thrive, creating jobs in construction, retail and housing just to name a handful. We have to keep moving forward and reinvent ourselves every day to adapt.

Of course these people are fundamentally different from those who "hinder development". The likes of which spend endless amount of time trying to change and control their environment instead of being the environment that others try to control. The amount of redundant historical "well read" banter is not a bad thing but just shows what the other side of the coin concerns themselves with and lives to postulate. "Poo poo-ing" others and trying to sound smart and look good while doing it might be what makes these people happy instead of building buildings, making money or transforming this city.

That being said:

a) The building at 20th and Capitol was a joke. Glad it's gone. Midtown is a goldmine of bulldoze-able parcels and this is just the start. The transformation currently taking shape in midtown is just the tip of the iceberg.

b) Although arguing over semantics on a forum which holds, for the most part, a completely different point of view and clogging every section may pass the time or provide a venue for releasing creative/intellectual steam- it has become quite disruptive. I don't think many of us are going to proclaim: "thank GOODNESS for the light! I never saw it that way! Thank GOODNESS for the incredible all knowing historical figure, I don't know what I would have done with my limited knowledge and lack of facts". As a trained debater I can reassure you these arguments will never end and continue to clog the forums as there is no such thing as the perfect argument-for or against.

c) Preservationists fail to recognize that maybe the original builders of mediocre "historical" buildings turn in their graves when people try to preserve them. What if their original intent was never to create a historical building but to make some money at the time? I'm sure they would be in favor of progress and re-building. I can reassure you preservationists didn't build historical buildings. Builders did. Just to be clear, when I refer to historical buildings I am strictly speaking of those hardly historical rickety structures downtown / midtown Sacramento, not actual historical buildings.

d) Utopian views about what is best for "the most of us" regarding what should not be built midtown is grossly negligent and incredibly ill suited when many people live in the area BECAUSE of the transformation taking place. Myself included. These views and sometimes actions against development are incredibly sicking especially when these views physically stand in the way of a developer's right to proposer. I like new things being built. I am excited about the next new development. That is why I visit the forum (lurking til now) and live in midtown. This last and final point begs the question: if you are fighting to preserve a certain building which no one really cares to preserve- who are you preserving the building for? At least in this forum, the pretense that others share the same view is false.

cheers!



I just read your post, so I thought I'd chime in since unfortunately not alot is going on in new construction. First, welcome to the forum. The point about preserving buildings that "no one really cares about" is flawed logic. Obviously the person fighting to save the building is the one who cares about it, and they are fighting for their own sense of what is important. If we as a society continued to only leave standing and build buildings that the majority wanted, we would end up with a boring homogeny--constantly culling the oddballs creates a middle of the road result--the building equivalent of only watching American Idol. If you don't have the super modern strange buildings because "no one cares about them" and you don't have the strange old homely little buildings because "no one cares about them", you get a mediocre short spectrum of middle of the road buildings. I prefer interesting variety. I would prefer the building equivalent of a corny Film Noir next to A Clockwork Orange next to a Honeymooner's rerun next to The Jerk next to an Animation Festival. Is any of these an example of the best in their genre? Maybe not, but if you took out maybe the Honeymooners and the corny Film Noir and replaced them with a whole season of Friends, would you necessarily have a more interesting block? Maybe while Friends was popular. What everyone thinks is a good building today may not be what everyone thinks is a good building tomorrow. Styles change. As a city we will do better to have a diversified portfolio of building stock than to sell a large portion of one type of stock and buy a whole bunch of what's hot now. Maybe the hot trend will be weird old wood buildings in the future. Who would have thought in the 30's that auto garages downtown would house some of the trendiest restaurants in Sacramento today? The problem is, if we sell our old stock, we can never buy it back in the future if it starts to be popular again. I mean even the ones that "aren't worth preserving" in our current definition of "worth preserving". Obviously, popular opinion of everything that has been demolished in Sacramento at the time it was demolished was that it "wasn't worth preserving". The thing that's great about Sacramento is, to continue with the stock portfolio analogy, we don't have sell off most of the one to get the other--we have so many wasted empty lots and surface parking lots and the railyards. We should be building high and dense on these, and we don't have to sacrifice so much of the diversity to current tastes. If we both sell off a chunk of the old and buy only the new, the old becomes a smaller and smaller ratio of our holdings, and we lose our portfolio's diversity, which is what keeps us a healthy desirable city through changing fads. We can always build an unlimited amount of new, and we can never build even one single old thing. We need radical buildings--very tall and very modern and very unusual--and part of what is hot now. At the same time---we need Perspective! Perspective that times and styles and fads change. To get rid of what is not hot now for what is hot now lacks Perspective.

Your description of "developers" is far too simplified. Some developers have great vision and build really great things and leave a legacy. Some developers have no vision, bad taste, and/or build really bad projects that actually harm the evolution of the city, and it isn't because Preservationists stopped them from doing an amazing project---its because some developers just don't care about building anything great; they are just doing a job. Of course, as has been said many times on this board --its their land which they just chose to buy with an old building on it and they can do what they want and further if they can afford to buy up every piece of property in a 4 block area in Downtown, they can do what they want with it, including leveling all of the highrises that block their view of the Capitol from their office, and no one nearby gets to complain about their own property values going down as a result because developers can do what they want with the property they buy. (Yes, I just presented an ironic exaggeration based on an extrapolation.) But what are we discussing on this forum if we only discuss the projects we are personally developing. The boards would probably get pretty quiet.

[wburg]

The nugget in the SACOG article above caught my eye:


Plans for Streetcar

Even projects that fully comply with the Blueprint have their problems. Mark Friedman, a local developer, is working on a mixed-use development across the Sacramento River from the California State Capitol, the heart of downtown. In his loftlike office, a retrofitted former Pontiac-dealership, Mr. Friedman points to a sleek architectural model to show how a streetcar would connect apartments, office buildings and retail, making cars unnecessary.

Except that without building housing first, there won't be enough people to justify the state and local money that will help finance a streetcar. And without the streetcar, the carless project doesn't work. "It's a chicken-and-egg situation," says Mr. Friedman.

Which is why the Sacramento/West Sac streetcar plan doesn't include state or federal money...it will be funded partially by sales tax, part by special assessment district, and part by parking and hotel room fees. Thus, you don't have to wait years for state/federal money that might not arrive.

And the folks doing the streetcar know a secret that made men like Borax Smith and Henry Huntington rich: you run your streetcar from a place with buildings to a place WITHOUT buildings--then you build buildings in the place without! The difference in the 21st century is to do it in infill/brownfield locations instead of greenfields, but the logic is the same. Build the streetcar, the housing comes later--as long as you build it smart, relatively dense, and close to the streetcar line.

[SacTownAndy]

I just posted this in the suburban development thread but figured I put it here too so we can keep everything in one place. I had forgotten about this. Pretty significant development... and $1B? That's almost as much as the new airport expansion.


http://media.sacbee.com/smedia/2008/05/07/20/197-4M8CASINODRAW.standalone.prod_affiliate.4.JPG
Source: www.sacbee.com/101/story/922065.html




Groundbreaking marks start of Thunder Valley expansion
By Art Campos - acampos@sacbee.com
Last Updated 2:09 pm PDT Tuesday, July 15, 2008

The United Auburn Indian Community will break ground Wednesday at Thunder Valley Casino near Lincoln on an expansion project that will include construction of a 23-story hotel atop the current gaming facility.

Besides the planned five-star, 650-room hotel, the facility will include a convention center, ballrooms, more gaming space, restaurants, a spa, a lounge, a 3,000-seat performing arts center and a parking structure.

The ceremony will begin at 11 a.m. at the south-entrance parking lot at the casino, 1212 Athens Ave.

Doug Elmets, a spokesman for the Indian tribe, which owns the casino, said in a news release that the expansion project will create about 1,000 construction jobs and 1,200 permanent jobs. Completion is set for July 2010, he said.

Analysts have estimated cost of the expansion to be $1 billion.

When completed, the project will generate $10.2 million in property tax, $900,000 in food and beverage taxes and $1 million in occupancy tax annually for Placer County.

[innov8]

The Design Commission approved John Saca’s Metropolitan Tower tonight
and yesterday the City Council signed off on the plan

The tower was approved consisting of 190 condo units and 190 hotel rooms
along with ground floor retail and restaurant space. The approved tower
would rise 410’ to the roof and 435’ to the top of the spire.

Since Nov. of last year, a few changes were made to the exterior like a
grander/taller lobby, more precast concrete giving it a bolder civic look and
a darker color. Over all, the high-rise now has a more traditional look.
The original design was sleek and modern and most all the design commission
members said that they really like it... but some where between Nov. and
today, the design was taken back to a more traditional style.

This tower is still quite a ways from breaking ground. With the current
housing mess and credit crunch gripping the nation, Saca’s probably
several years away from breaking ground.

I really like the darker color and additional use concrete giving the building
more contrast.

http://img155.imageshack.us/img155/650/themetropolitianjstpersdq4.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

[doriankage]

^^^
So even with the hotel ,which could be the Continental from the Towers, it's still years away?
I understand the credit crunch and all, I thought with a hotel in it, it would help get the project off the ground quicker.

[wburg]

The problem is that you still need financing to build big things, and financing isn't exactly easy to come by with banks starting to go belly-up and needing federal bailouts. The economy being in a tizzy also means fewer people doing recreational travel, thus lowering the potential number of people that might visit this hotel--ditto for business travelers, while business isn't booming so much. Give it a few years.

[doriankage]

The problem is that you still need financing to build big things, and financing isn't exactly easy to come by with banks starting to go belly-up and needing federal bailouts. The economy being in a tizzy also means fewer people doing recreational travel, thus lowering the potential number of people that might visit this hotel--ditto for business travelers, while business isn't booming so much. Give it a few years.

Sorry for my ignorance. I am currently living in Spain, so I am really not affected by all the shit going on back home.

However, you figure with conventions and all, don't you think downtown could use another hotel and absorb the 190 rooms?

[Majin]

Give me a break, it will likely take 2 years to complete construction. 190 condos would easily sell in 2 years time. He could break tomorrow and be sold out by the time the condos are ready to be moved into.

[doriankage]

I like Majins thinking on this.
Only way to make money is to spend money!

[Majin]

Everybody likes the way I think, but only a few admit it.

[wburg]

I like Majins thinking on this.
Only way to make money is to spend money!

Yeah, but it takes money to spend money, and Saca doesn't have enough in his couch cushions to finance this. Thus, he'll need money from investors, and they're a bit twitchy right now. Considering the number of unsold and price-reduced condo units in the central city, plus all the ones with "now leasing" signs where there used to be "for sale" signs, it's not going to be easy.

[Pistola916]

I'm excited for this project. I know its still 2-3 years down the road, but the next 3-7 years Sac will be looking at a new airport terminal, museum expansion, this Metropolitan project, and we know there will be at least two towers on the "hole in the ground" on Capitol mall. Meridian II could start next year and I think that will be the next high-rise to start construction. There's room for another tower where Aura was going to be built. And all the little infill projects in Midtown, around Sutter's Fort is much as important as the high-rise. A new streetcar line. Also a brand new Kings arena, hopefully. Yes, the economy sucks butt, but the real estate market will pick up, so Sac is heading to a brighter future as we get to 2015.

[SactownTom]

I saw that they’re going vertical at the Crocker.

I also noticed that the blue windows are going in on the bottom floors of 500 Capitol Mall (not sure how that’s going to turn out).

[sactjs]

I really dislike those windows. At first I was hoping it was some sort of protective plastic covering that was going to be peeled away once the windows were installed. Unfortunately, it's their actual color. Everything was looking so nice until they put those in...ugh

[innov8]

I really dislike those windows. At first I was hoping it was some sort of protective plastic covering that was going to be peeled away once the windows were installed. Unfortunately, it's their actual color. Everything was looking so nice until they put those in...ugh


The thing I have noticed about those window at 500CM is that they don't
reflect the blue color unless the sky is actually relfecting off them.
I think the bright blue color will really start to stand out
as they put more windows up higher and higher on the tower.

[ltsmotorsport]

Yeah, but it takes money to spend money, and Saca doesn't have enough in his couch cushions to finance this. Thus, he'll need money from investors, and they're a bit twitchy right now. Considering the number of unsold and price-reduced condo units in the central city, plus all the ones with "now leasing" signs where there used to be "for sale" signs, it's not going to be easy.

Well, let's just hope he can find a reliable investor that won't bail on him in the middle of construction this time.

[Cynikal]

I'm really surprised that no one here has mentioned the Oak Park Fresh and Easy debate. Or is everyone here so grid focused that Oak Park doesn't matter?

[wburg]

Please, fill us in about the Fresh and Easy debate--what's up?

[otnemarcaS]

Please, fill us in about the Fresh and Easy debate--what's up?

Maybe about debate below .....

The Sacramento, California-based Plumbers and Pipefitters Local 447 union is hitting former NBA basketball all-star and Sacramento native Kevin Johnson hard with a new website and series of mailers to voters as the Sacramento developer who is bringing a Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market grocery store to land he owns in Sacramento's Oak Park neighborhood is battling the city's incumbent mayor Heather Fargo in a hot runoff election for Mayor of Sacramento.

Rest of the long blog here (http://freshneasybuzz.blogspot.com/2008/07/fresh-feature-former-nba-all-star-who.html)

[Grimnebulin]

All Fresh & Easy expansion plans have been put on hold as of a few months back. So it's kind of a moot point right now.

[wburg]

Apparently the Oak Park Fresh & Easy just went before the Design Director last Thursday.

[goldcntry]

It must be the only one then... they pulled the "Notice of Alchohol Sales" from the Bradshaw and Old Placerville location months ago and now an undisclosed business looks to be starting a remodel job on the space...

http://www.sacfrg.org/images/sleepytomato.gif

[creamcityleo79]

It must be the only one then... they pulled the "Notice of Alchohol Sales" from the Bradshaw and Old Placerville location months ago and now an undisclosed business looks to be starting a remodel job on the space...

http://www.sacfrg.org/images/sleepytomato.gif
I hadn't noticed that. I'll have to check it out! By the way, have you seen the new restaurant on the north side of 50 on Bradshaw? A real beauty! ;) It's called Pizza and Chicken Love Letter! I KID YOU NOT!!!

http://beenup2-photos.s3.amazonaws.com/4922/33a2952e-66ee-4044-be49-0fc715503ef4-m.jpeg?260

[Grimnebulin]

All Fresh & Easy expansion plans have been put on hold as of a few months back. So it's kind of a moot point right now.
My bad as usual! :sly: It was only a three month moratorium on expansion. Expansion plans restarted up at the end of June. :tup:

[creamcityleo79]

My bad as usual! :sly: It was only a three month moratorium on expansion. Expansion plans restarted up at the end of June. :tup:
I was going to say....I hadn't heard anything. I'm glad it's still a go!:tup:

[goldcntry]

I hadn't noticed that. I'll have to check it out! By the way, have you seen the new restaurant on the north side of 50 on Bradshaw? A real beauty! ;) It's called Pizza and Chicken Love Letter! I KID YOU NOT!!!


Oh my gosh! That is a riot... no I haven't seen it yet.

As to the other topic on the store... Maybe the Fresh and Easy IS still going in and they took down the notices cause they've been through the mandated time frame already... Food for thought...

:banana:

[Tenebrist]

I did some googling. It's a Korean fried chicken (and maybe pizza?) chain.

From this website (http://www.tylercowensethnicdiningguide.com/2007/05/cheogajip_chicken_1.php)
Pizza & Chicken Love Letter is the U.S. brand name of Cheogajip Chicken Korea.

Cheogajip Chicken is one of Korea's largest chicken franchise with 1,200 franchises in Korea.

Cheogajip Chicken has been loved by everyone for its classic, mouthwatering taste, which was developed through 17 years of experience.

Cheogajip USA was established in March of 2005 and opened its first restaurant in Annandale, Virginia in October 2005.

Soon after, in March 2006, a second restaurant was opened in Centreville, Virginia, followed by a third in Flushing, New York in April 2006.

In order to reach more customers, [they] are planning to expand with more restaurants throughout the East Coast this year and in the earlier part of 2007, [they] will spread out to the West Coast starting with Los Angeles.

Yelp reviews -
Pizza & Chicken Love Letter (http://www.yelp.com/biz/pizza-and-chicken-love-letter-garden-grove) - Garden Grove, CA
Pizza & Chicken Love Letter (http://www.yelp.com/biz/love-letter-pizza-and-chicken-duluth) - Duluth, GA
Cheogajip Chicken (http://www.yelp.com/biz/cheogajip-chicken-centreville) - Centervillle, VA
Cheogajip Chicken (http://www.yelp.com/biz/cheogajip-chicken-annandale) - Annandale, VA
Chow Down Atlanta review -
Pizza & Chicken Love Letter (http://www.chowdownatlanta.com/love-letter-korean-fried-chicken-finally/) - Atlanta, GA

[patriot713]

someone posted a few photos about this place the former traveloge
i was wondering if anyone had anymore info about it. website. address. cross streets? thanks

[TowerDistrict]

http://www.hellerpacific.com/images/retrolodge/02.jpg

http://www.hellerpacific.com/images/retrolodge/retrolodge.gif

Heller Pacific Retrolodge (http://www.hellerpacific.com/retrolodge.php?grp=01)
1111 & 1029 H Street
Sacramento, CA 95811

Renovation of the 1959 Travelodge motel complex includes 50 work/live units ranging from 250 to 650 sf, a coffeehouse, and a deli. The two buildings, the Astro and Elroy, will have a mid-century modern look with recessed exterior lighting, wood paneling, and decorative landscaping. The Astro (west building) has about 9,100 sf and the Elroy (east building) has approximately 10,600 sf, including up to 2,500 sf of first-floor retail space.

Now Leasing: 916-638-2400 for information

[sugit]

I found a couple projects out there in the design phase.

The 17th and S one looks like is the the lot next to Safeway and across from Hanger 17.

609 9th Street:
16 story mixed-use residential high rise marks the north transition from the Central City. This unique design includes 5 town homes at the base—which tie the tower into the street fabric of the historic Alkali Flat neighborhood, 135 residential condominiums, 15000 SF of office space, retail and public plaza.

http://www.monighan.com/listing/new_9th.jpg


Seventeen17 S Street
At 192,000 square feet this mixed-use, in-fill, “neighborhood in a box” transforms the east end of Sacramento’s R Street Corridor with 147 residential units and 19,000 SF of on-street commercial. The edgy, modern industrial design picks up cues from the historic R Street railroad, warehouse corridor, blending it seamlessly into a quasi residential neighborhood.

http://www.monighan.com/listing/new_17.jpg

[Majin]

Timeline?

[sugit]

Your guess is as good as mine...

[Grimnebulin]

Nice find! Cool buildings! :tup:

[Pistola916]

I like them both. It will add life to those areas

[TowerDistrict]

Wow. Those are a couple big projects. I wasn't expecting such a substantial project for the site behind safeway there... It looks like the architect (http://sites.eoi.com/folder19619/index.cfm?id=6820&fuseaction=browse&pageid=34) is the same for both projects - i guess they are the same developer?

[slaiguy]

609 9th st, that is where the current Sac County Employment office is, are there plans from county to move?

[wburg]

Both are still in the design phase, they haven't even been formally submitted to the city, so we're talking a few years out. I have heard some things about the 17th and S project.

I wonder what a "quasi-residential" neighborhood is? The neighborhood just to the south of S Street is residential, no "quasi" about it, and consists almost entirely of bungalows built from the 1890s-1930s. While I don't think it would be necessary to make the south facing look like a gargantuan Queen Anne cottage, it's hard to imagine how edgy, modern industrial design would blend seamlessly into that.

[BrianSac]

:previous:
I like the design and ambition. I will be surprised if something of that size gets built on S street. I hope it does.

Wburg: What design would work for you on 17th and S? Is the building too big for your tastes. What height would be acceptable?

[wburg]

BrianSac: Actually I don't have a big problem with that size, considering that the S Street frontage will be two stories with a setback. That gives the existing street trees a chance for survival, and comes close to matching the scale of the residential neighborhood across the street. Personally I like the way the Safeway looks along S Street--something of similar size and detail to the Safeway, or like the retail spaces along N Street and the Sutter garage (but two stories tall) would be fine in my book.

My response was more of my instinctive reaction to the market-speak, stuff like "quasi-residential neighborhood" or the argument that a modern design fits in well with century-old buildings, than opposition to the building itself. I've seen that rendering (or earlier iterations of it) sitting in one of the offices behind the Safeway for the past year or so.

The site itself is part of the R Street corridor, one of those infill sites we have been talking about--places where we want the bulk of new central city residents to go. I figure in a decade or so we'll see a whole string of them (of various sizes) going up along R Street, filling up the vacant lots where old industrial stuff (and the occasional residential neighborhood) was torn down, with the remaining historic buildings (like Crystal Ice, the CADA warehouse, THE SPACE, etc) knitting together the new buildings.

[TowerDistrict]

My response was more of my instinctive reaction to the market-speak, stuff like "quasi-residential neighborhood" or the argument that a modern design fits in well with century-old buildings, than opposition to the building itself. I've seen that rendering (or earlier iterations of it) sitting in one of the offices behind the Safeway for the past year or so.

I reread that line a few times, and I think they tripped themselves up on what they were trying to say. It sounds like they are saying the new building will blend the industrial area into a quasi-residential neighborhood - not insinuating that it would transform the decidedly residential neighborhood south of the site into anything other than what it is now.

I dunno about the design overall. It's not mind blowing. But it would put another 147 units of residential into an area adjacent to nightlife, shopping, and transit.

Speaking of this building, what the hell happened to Regis Homes' plan on 300 Q? This 17 & S looks very close to that building, only on half a block and half the residential units. I don't think they're going to want to unveil their products at the same exact time.

[urban_encounter]

Timeline?


2018

[sugit]

Hopefully this pans out...this could help pave the way for the Marshall Hotel reuse project.

Sacramento selects downtown location for new housing project
Former police crime lab would be razed and replaced with mid-rise
Sacramento Business Journal - by Michael Shaw Staff writer

After hiring city manager Ray Kerridge from Portland, Ore., and studying that city’s streetcar system, Sacramento is again looking to the city to the north for inspiration.

At the northwest corner of 7th and H streets, Sacramento is hoping to duplicate a downtown Portland low-income housing project completed in 2004 that includes employment services, mental health treatment and free or low-cost meal programs in the lower floors.

The Sacramento Housing and Redevelopment Agency is proposing to replace a vacant police crime lab there with a 150- to 200-unit mid-rise building.

“This is going to be a signature project,” SHRA assistant director Diane Luther said. “We’re looking for strong architectural values and a green building.”

SHRA will ask the City Council on Tuesday to sell the site to the agency for $3 million in tax increment funds and to approve an additional $440,000 to demolish the city-owned building and remove or contain hazardous materials. The price came from an independent appraisal, Luther said.

If approved, SHRA would seek an experienced low-income housing developer to secure financing and build the project, estimated to cost about $30 million. If a developer is selected by November, construction could start in 2010.

Sacramento city leaders set a goal in 2006 of increasing the number of low-income units for single occupants, in part to deal with a chronic homelessness problem. That includes maintaining at least 1,000 units of what’s known as single-room occupancy housing, or SROs, where low-income residents are housed in efficiency apartments. The city has about 700 such units now.

“What we’re trying to do as a city is to make sure the SROs are well-run, managed well and replaced,” Mayor Heather Fargo said. “This particular site seemed right. The building there has outlived its usefulness. Its neighbors are a parking garage, a jail and the county administration building.”

Fargo and others recently toured the Portland project, known as 8 Northwest 8th, that was built by a low-income housing agency, and came away impressed.

“There are services that aid people in the building and those who live elsewhere,” she said.

City Councilman Ray Tretheway, whose district includes the downtown area, toured the Portland project as well and said Sacramento needs alternatives to the current SRO stock that is mostly old hotels converted into apartments.

Tretheway said he believes there is unanimous support for the project.

“This area is a transitional area from city and county functions into the Alkali Flat neighborhood, the city’s oldest neighborhood,” Tretheway said.

The police department’s crime laboratory and storage areas at the site moved along with other police functions to a city-owned building at 300 Richards Blvd.

http://cll.bizjournals.com/story_image/201213-400-0-1.jpg

The former police crime lab at 7th and H streets would be a “green” low-income housing project.

[wburg]

Great news indeed. Replacing the housing, rather than just giving people a check and the boot, means that the folks who live in the Marshall will have a place to go, instead of a high risk of ending up on the street.

[Grimnebulin]

Great news indeed. Replacing the housing, rather than just giving people a check and the boot, means that the folks who live in the Marshall will have a place to go, instead of a high risk of ending up on the street.

http://www.s2ki.com/forums/html/emoticons/iagree.gif

[SactownTom]

Having on-site services is key to making projects like these a success. I think this is a great project and a perfect location.

[snfenoc]

It finally looks like something of substance is happening at The Trammell Crow site:

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0004.jpg

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0003.jpg




The Sutter foundation building / plant is starting to get its facade:

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0048.jpg

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0050.jpg

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0055.jpg




The Artsy office building near the Sutter expansion is also starting to get its facade, which is pretty much a wall of glass:

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0007.jpg

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0009.jpg




The State of California central plant expansion is going vertical:

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0043.jpg

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0044.jpg




The Crocker Art Museum expansion is also going vertical. I hope that USA flag is not the final height - weak.

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0042.jpg




The Orleans "Hotel" has its st-yucco facade on. It looks a little bland right now, but the finishing touches are just beginning:

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0041.jpg

Funny to think that it's actually one of the tallest buildings in Old Sacramento - they've done a good job hiding the height at street level.




Roos Atkins is nearly complete:

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0018.jpg




Same with the Cosmo Cabaret:

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0022.jpg

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0012.jpg


I like the vertical glass pieces:

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0015.jpg


And the interior light fixtures:

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0013.jpg




The Framing for the bump out on the Citizen Hotel is up:

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0046.jpg




The fireproofing at 500 Crapitol Mall is inching toward the top:

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0023.jpg

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0031.jpg

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0035.jpg

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0038.jpg

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0036.jpg

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0034.jpg

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0027.jpg

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0029.jpg

OK, would somebody please remove the blue protective tape from the top and bottom of each window unit? It's really starting to look tacky.




That's all I got. Thanks for viewing:

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0024.jpg

[ltsmotorsport]

Lookin' good around town, although I was really hoping the tacky old tile cladding on the Cosmopolitan was gonna be gone. That stuff is horribly 60's.

[sactown_2007]

http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb297/snfenoc/Construction%20Update%208-2-08/DSC_0012.jpg

:previous:

I bet this sign looks sweet at night!! :)

I am not sure how I like the glass yet on 500 Capitol Mall. I am keeping my fingers crossed that the blue will blend in better once they get it installed and all the lighter blue stripes actually go around the building. We will get a better idea of this once they start getting it up on a few floors higher up. I tend to think the blue is way too light and should at least be darker. But at least the fire proofing is progressing quite nicely!!!

Thanks for the updates snfenoc and great job!!! :tup:

[arod74]

Lookin' good around town, although I was really hoping the tacky old tile cladding on the Cosmopolitan was gonna be gone. That stuff is horribly 60's.

I kinda like the small beige tiles. Looks retro yet also modern which is some of the look I think they are going for. Sweet photo update snfenoc, a nice weekend to be out and about walking and shooting. Thanks..

[snfenoc]

http://www.sacbee.com/101/story/1132562.html

Angelides says he can solve east Sacramento's vexing 'Centrage' site
By Mary Lynne Vellinga - mlvellinga@sacbee.com
Published 12:00 am PDT Tuesday, August 5, 2008

As state treasurer, Phil Angelides championed programs to encourage "infill" development in existing city neighborhoods.

Now that he's out of office, Angelides is tackling one of Sacramento's most difficult urban development sites – 48 acres next to the Capital City Freeway in east Sacramento.

For two decades, this wedge of land hemmed in by the freeway and a set of elevated railroad tracks has been a black hole sucking up developers' dreams.

Angelides, who grew up in east Sacramento, submitted a plan to the city last week to build 397 tightly packed single-family homes on the former orchard, now a vacant field.

Angelides calls his plan McKinley Village. The property is popularly known as Centrage, after the high-rise office, apartment and hotel project proposed for it in the early 1990s by high-tech executive James Lennane. That plan was killed by the Sacramento City Council after intense protest from the neighborhood.

Angelides said his all-residential proposal is less likely to ignite a backlash from residents of adjacent east Sacramento and River Park than some of the previous ideas, which included a shopping center, an auto mall, and Lennane's high-rise "European style" village.

Angelides said he is seeking to "create a 21st century green urban village that draws on the best aspects of Sacramento's existing neighborhoods."

He has teamed up with builder John Laing Homes, which has built urban-style housing projects in such locales as Hercules and the intersection of Hollywood Boulevard and North La Brea Avenue in Los Angeles.

"I'd say it's the best of the Centrage plans I've ever seen, and I've seen quite a few," said City Councilman Steve Cohn. "I've kind of lost count. I think I've seen at least five or six, probably seven."

Angelides, like many experts in the planning field, said he thinks demand for housing close to downtown will boom in the coming years amid concern about traffic, global warming and gas prices.

"There are a set of forces that are going to accelerate demand for urban infill housing," Angelides said.

Before Angelides was elected treasurer in 1998 and ran an unsuccessful campaign for governor in 2006, he was a major developer in Sacramento. He started in the business by working for Angelo K. Tsakopoulos, the region's largest land developer, and later started his own company.

The Centrage site is currently owned by Tsakopoulos, who is in escrow to sell it to Angelides. Seven acres will be set aside for a Greek Orthodox church.

As a developer, Angelides built mostly large suburban projects on former farm fields. He received national attention for Laguna West, a project in Elk Grove that included "New Urbanist" design concepts aimed as creating a more walkable community where people could live near jobs.

Houses in Laguna West included front porches and garages tucked behind houses – novel concepts at the time.

Angelides now splits his time between Sacramento and Los Angeles. He is chairman of the Los Angeles-based Canyon-Johnson Urban Communities Fund, part of a $2 billion urban investment fund co-founded by former Los Angeles Laker Earvin "Magic" Johnson. He joined Canyon-Johnson in January. His particular mission is to acquire more than 10,000 existing apartment units in urban centers around the country and fix them up for working families.

The former treasurer said the McKinley Village project is a personal venture.

In creating the plan for McKinley Village, Angelides hired the same architect, Peter Calthorpe, who designed Laguna West. Angelides said the houses in McKinley Village also will have front porches and parking in back. The plan includes two 1-acre parks, common green areas and a street with a median parkway designed to resemble T Street in Sacramento's Elmhurst neighborhood.

The Centrage site will be an expensive one to develop. A road will have to be punched under a railroad levee separating the property from east Sacramento, and an existing road and bridge leading across the freeway from midtown will need to be improved. The site lacks roads, sewers and utilities.

The last developer to propose building on the property, Cambridge Homes, backed off after the housing market softened. Cambridge Homes' plan was similar to the one submitted by Angelides, but it included multi-family housing.

"It's going to be expensive to develop," said Cambridge President Chris Stevens.

Angelides expects the residential real estate market to turn around by the time he's ready to break ground. "We're really looking at opening new homes here in the spring of 2011," he said. "We think our timing is excellent."

[Majin]

Garbage.

[ozone]

I agree sactown_2007. My first reaction to the glass on 500 Capitol Mall was something like snfenoc's. Then I realized that it was the design and I didn't like it. Now I think it might look OK and I'll just have to wait untill more of the glass is installed to make a judgement. The last thing Sacramento needs is more boring buildings and the US Bank in my opinion is a real dud.

[ozone]

And about the so-called Centrage site. I think they should just turn it into a park and build a pedestrian bridge across CCF linking it to the future Sutter Landing Park.

http://img150.imageshack.us/img150/3589/clipboahl8.jpg