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  #1  
Old Posted Dec 23, 2011, 2:55 AM
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What is the Identity of Sacramento?

We have all written about this at some point on this thread--but when other people are approached with this question I am often surprised at how many say there is no identity or culture to Sacramento. Obviously this is not true. Our region is more than the city of trees or the city surrounded by farmland. Who are we?

As fellow lovers of urbanity, architecture, design and the culture all these things produce, what would you say is the identity of our fair city?

Feel free to post images, abstract or real, that helps articulate your impressions--what can I say, I am very visual

Look forward to hearing from all of you!
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  #2  
Old Posted Dec 23, 2011, 4:04 AM
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Now there's a can of worms...I think I have spent a lot of time over the past few years answering this question in one form or another. A city's identity is built up out of its history and its built environment. But sometimes a loss of the built environment can disguise some of its history. Maybe it could be said that Sacramento has a secret identity?
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Old Posted Dec 23, 2011, 5:09 AM
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I like a can of worms and am actually hoping for one--I suppose.

A secret identity or a forgotten identity? Perhaps one that is in flux or just coming to be?
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Old Posted Dec 23, 2011, 6:32 AM
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City identities change over time--plenty of cities' current identity doesn't bear much relation to their past identity, for good or ill. Compare Detroit or St. Louis in their current state to their stature at their height, or Seattle and Portland today compared to 30 years ago before they became media darlings due to fashions in urban planning or rock music.

As to what identities this city has had, just look at its past. We were never a sleepy farm community or bucolic small town. We were born as a city, as a center for trade and transportation. We grew up in the shadow of our bigger sister San Francisco, which in some ways stunted our urban growth, especially as the folks who got rich here tended to move there to build great public works, and left their old Sacramento houses to use as orphanages. We were an industrial city, turning the product of the surrounding resource area into something that could be shipped, and even building railroads to allow the shipment of those goods (and locomotives to pull those trains.) We were a sin city too--where farmers, miners and migrant workers came to blow their hard-earned pay on booze and debauchery, and Sacramentans, natural merchants gifted at separating workers and travelers from their paychecks, provided the services they desired, even when they were illegal (for example, Sacramento pretty much ignored Prohibition.) We were a creative city, with our own homegrown musical and artistic talent--even if so many of the talented left for San Francisco to seek patronage from the wealthy who had moved there first. So a lot of the credit due to those who did remain is seldom suitably recognized, because it's just "folk art" or "pop art," or in the case of some Sacramentans who have received international prominence for their creativity, some assume they aren't worth knowing about if they are from here.
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Old Posted Dec 23, 2011, 4:33 PM
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That is a really nice hsitoric summary. I myself have to admit that I have never really viewed Sacramento through that particular lens. It also begs the question of, what now?

What I find most revealing in that summary is the comparison with SF. It is no surprise our history is tied to SF and so we are automatically brought down to the status of "Little Sister" which many interpret as being secondary, or perhaps even inferior. I don't believe that is true but I am not sure why--I think that is why I have started this blog.

Do we still rely on that relationship with SF? It appears to some extent yes. I have noticed people in the area are often dreaming of moving to SF or SD. However, I have also noticed post grads returning to the area hoping to make a change. Has this always been the case or have individuals begun to view this region differently over the last decade? I would be curious to track where graduates from UC Davis land themselves. . . I would not be surprised if more end up in SF or LA than in Sac.
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Old Posted Dec 23, 2011, 4:57 PM
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Not sure what our identity is but I do know we sorely neglect much of our history. Look around Sacramento. It was the start/end of perhaps the most important infrastructure project in American history...yet almost nothing in town would suggest that.
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Old Posted Dec 23, 2011, 8:22 PM
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Few cities in the U.S. are blessed like Sacramento is with such a prime location... if you head West it's not too far to the coast and San Francisco bay. Wine country surrounds Sacramento on 3 sides. If you go East the Sierra Nevada mountains are right there, and all the great outdoor activities they offer. A lot of people who live here like to brag about this, and it's true! It's hard to think of another city with so many options nearby.

That said, I think Sacramento has a long way to go before it reaches its potential as a city, a great potential due in part to its favorable location. Although some will bring up Sacramento's urban history, it still feels like a suburb to me. The zoning code has a lot of restrictions written into it that promote low density in the urban core, effectively pushing new residents out to the ever expanding suburbs.

I dream of Sacramento becoming a dense, urban city at the confluence of the American and Sacramento Rivers. The stubborn city planners need to take another look at the zoning code , as well as the building code, and ask themselves "what can be changed to allow the city to blossom?". Things like allowing buildings to connect at their sides, and decreasing the required setbacks front and back would encourage denser development so that some neighborhoods could acquire the urban quality that parts of Sacramento had before post-war redevelopment.
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  #8  
Old Posted Dec 23, 2011, 8:54 PM
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Originally Posted by urbanadvocate View Post
Do we still rely on that relationship with SF? It appears to some extent yes. I have noticed people in the area are often dreaming of moving to SF or SD. However, I have also noticed post grads returning to the area hoping to make a change. Has this always been the case or have individuals begun to view this region differently over the last decade? I would be curious to track where graduates from UC Davis land themselves. . . I would not be surprised if more end up in SF or LA than in Sac.
Our relationship with SF isn't quite the same as it was then, but I think there is more to be gained by cooperation with other regions of California than competition. As one of those postgrads who moved back to Sacramento after college (actually, I never lived in Sacramento growing up around here, not until after graduation) specifically because I wanted to live here, I am quite sure there are plenty of reasons to stay--they just aren't as well-publicized as they should be. And that's really the key: because of various events in our past, and the era when Sacramento experienced the most growth, it often doesn't feel like the city that it is, which causes confusion when we experience big-city problems. If people think we're a suburb, they're more likely to try to shove those problems under a rug (How can we have that problem if we're not a city?) or assume that it is some fault of our civic identity (We must be a really awful place to have city problems while not being a city!) rather than addressing them.

There is plenty of room for growth and density in our infill areas. Many cities put limitations on growth in areas where they don't feel growth is appropriate--we're not alone in that, Sacramento didn't invent zoning. Generally, cities that direct new growth to specific areas end up successful. Just allowing "open season" on development actually makes things worse--they don't get any more development than cities who focus and plan their growth, but it usually ends up being growth the city is less happy with in the long run.

So, what now? Start by marketing the things that we haven't marketed, and promoting our real past (Sacramento as industrial/transportation center) instead of the false agrarian myth (Sacramento as suburban farm town.) None of this rules out having pleasant residential neighborhoods--lots of big cities have pleasant residential neighborhoods, along with bustling downtowns. They aren't mutually exclusive, and actually work together quite well. Generally, "return to the urban core" means "return to historic areas in the urban core" first and foremost--new growth FOLLOWS restoration of existing urban fabric, it doesn't lead the way.

Yes, there is plenty that needs changing--simplified and comprehensible zoning codes, a more proactive and prescriptive building department that lets customers know what to expect and responds in timely fashion, and incentives that promote adaptive reuse, like Los Angeles' adaptive reuse ordinance that tripled downtown LA's population in eight years. But, as we found out when we tried it the last time, cities don't reach their potential by demolishing them first...they do so by promoting what is great about what is already here, and building on it.

The more we assert that identity, the fewer grads (and businesses) we'll lose to other metro areas--and the more from other areas we'll attract. It's already happening, as elements of Sacramento's identity are in fact being marketed with very positive results. We're already on the right track, in many ways.
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Old Posted Dec 23, 2011, 9:22 PM
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I like Sacramento and at times I even hate it, but I never love it. But I want to love it. I just don’t know if that will ever happen. There’s lot of people who feel the same way. One of the most irritating comments made, usually made by the born and raised, is that Sacramento will never change. They are not referring to a particular physical aspect but rather to an "Sacramento attitude" or the local culture. Cities are more than a collection of buildings; they are a collection of people. More than anything else, it’s the type of people who live in Sacramento that create its identity.

While I'll get into trouble generalizing about a group of people as diverse as Sacramentans there seems to be some shared traits by a large percentage of the people here --- Suburban-oriented. Uncreative, milquetoast bureaucrats who hate their jobs. People who deceided to play it ‘safe’ in life rather than take risks. Middle-of-the-road conservative Democrats. Beige and classless. Early to bed, late to rise. Neither charmingly traditional nor appealingly avant-garde. Generally unenthusiastic and astonishingly cynical for having done, been, and seen so little. Dare I say they are generally unsophisticated? I mean Taco Bell was named their favorite Mexican restaurant until the 2000’s.
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Old Posted Dec 23, 2011, 11:57 PM
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I like Sacramento and at times I even hate it, but I never love it. But I want to love it. I just don’t know if that will ever happen. There’s lot of people who feel the same way. One of the most irritating comments made, usually made by the born and raised, is that Sacramento will never change. They are not referring to a particular physical aspect but rather to an "Sacramento attitude" or the local culture. Cities are more than a collection of buildings; they are a collection of people. More than anything else, it’s the type of people who live in Sacramento that create its identity.

While I'll get into trouble generalizing about a group of people as diverse as Sacramentans there seems to be some shared traits by a large percentage of the people here --- Suburban-oriented. Uncreative, milquetoast bureaucrats who hate their jobs. People who deceided to play it ‘safe’ in life rather than take risks. Middle-of-the-road conservative Democrats. Beige and classless. Early to bed, late to rise. Neither charmingly traditional nor appealingly avant-garde. Generally unenthusiastic and astonishingly cynical for having done, been, and seen so little. Dare I say they are generally unsophisticated? I mean Taco Bell was named their favorite Mexican restaurant until the 2000’s.
Oh I find this train of thought very interesting! Let's explore it a bit.

I think this is all the more interesting when coupled with the fact that we experienced a lot of growth the past 10 years. Has this growth impacted the way Sacramentens view themselves or have the "newbies" just assimilated into the attitudes you discuss? Perhaps they are still just being drowned out?

Can their be a positive identity drawn from the attitudes you mention? Is it even a valid identity?

I am finding a lot of cynicism with my interaction with people but I am also finding a lot of energy that just has not yet coalesced . . .
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  #11  
Old Posted Dec 24, 2011, 12:40 AM
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I guess I don't run into the folks Ozone does very often. Nor do I run into many people who think that Sacramento will never change, whether they were born here or not. And maybe I just know more unconventional folks, but I meet plenty of people born and raised in the Sacramento region who define "avant-garde," including people who moved from whatever suburb they grew up in to Sacramento proper in order to be part of the local creative community. But perhaps we just run in different circles.

Sacramento is a middle-class city, partially due to that tendency for folks to move away once they strike it rich, partially because we have lost a lot of our working-class character as manufacturing/processing jobs moved away from the city. The middle class tends to be a little conservative, because when you're middle class you aren't financially suited to take big risks, and the reality of falling into poverty is very present. But the middle class also produces a lot of the so-called "creative class"--artists, musicians, designers and engineers.

I suppose I also see a difference between the folks in what I'd call "Sacramento" (that is, within the city limits) and folks in the greater Sacramento area. Folks who live outside the city limits seem to see themselves more at odds with what happens in Sacramento than in parallel. This isn't an uncommon attitude--you run into folks in the Chicago suburbs who haven't been inside the Loop in decades but have plenty to say about how things are horrible there, while others go downtown to visit or work but wouldn't want to live there. I suppose in some regions, the folks in the outer reaches look to the center city as the source of their identity (the Bay Area in particular seems to gauge the hipness and vitality of a place as inversely proportionate to its distance from San Francisco--the farther out, the more boring a place must be--in a process I call "Inverse Franciscanism.") But here, the surrounding regions seem particularly uncomfortable with the central city, even if they still come down for the occasional Second Saturday.
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  #12  
Old Posted Dec 26, 2011, 5:18 PM
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Few cities in the U.S. are blessed like Sacramento is with such a prime location... if you head West it's not too far to the coast and San Francisco bay. Wine country surrounds Sacramento on 3 sides. If you go East the Sierra Nevada mountains are right there, and all the great outdoor activities they offer. A lot of people who live here like to brag about this, and it's true! It's hard to think of another city with so many options nearby.

That said, I think Sacramento has a long way to go before it reaches its potential as a city, a great potential due in part to its favorable location. Although some will bring up Sacramento's urban history, it still feels like a suburb to me. The zoning code has a lot of restrictions written into it that promote low density in the urban core, effectively pushing new residents out to the ever expanding suburbs.

I dream of Sacramento becoming a dense, urban city at the confluence of the American and Sacramento Rivers. The stubborn city planners need to take another look at the zoning code , as well as the building code, and ask themselves "what can be changed to allow the city to blossom?". Things like allowing buildings to connect at their sides, and decreasing the required setbacks front and back would encourage denser development so that some neighborhoods could acquire the urban quality that parts of Sacramento had before post-war redevelopment.
That zoning code is currently being updated to better reflect the general plan update. Change is coming.
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Old Posted Dec 27, 2011, 7:17 AM
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Wburg I live and work in Midtown and not the outer suburbs. It's true that my friends and acquaintances live throughout the entire region. But I find many people in the outer suburbs -like Roseville and Granite Bay -have little connection to the City of Sacramento. Therefore, I don't consider them when I think of the character of this city. I'm thinking of the people who live here and make up the character of the city. And I have found these traits common, even if I was generalizing in the extreme. If you don't run into people with these attitudes I really don't know what to say. I think it's funny how you imply that your "circles" must be more artistic/creative than mine. This is a bit presumptuous since you do not know me. I could just as easily say that you might not be able to recognize these traits for good reason but I would never.

But I am more interested to understand why so many talented and creative people end up moving away? Why do people think Austin and Portland is cool and Sacramento is not? Maybe because Sacramento was a small city for so many years there's still a lot of that mentally left. It's particularly annoying in people who's job it is to move this city forward. The state government makes the greatest impact on the culture of Sacramento and in my opinion our economy is too dependent on that.

I think creating a UC campus at the Railyards would be the best thing we could do. Yeah I know we have UC Davis close by but that's not good enough. Berkeley is also close to San Francisco but it still has it's own UC -including a new UCSF campus @ Mission Bay. I think if spent the money on a new UC branch/campus where the proposed arena would go we'd be much better off in 10-30 years.

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Old Posted Dec 27, 2011, 7:42 AM
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How can Sacramento not be a great, interesting, big city. What a great location.
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  #15  
Old Posted Dec 27, 2011, 5:53 PM
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How can Sacramento not be a great, interesting, big city. What a great location.
Really? Define great, interesting, big city and great location.

Last edited by ozone; Dec 27, 2011 at 6:04 PM.
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Old Posted Dec 28, 2011, 4:14 AM
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ozone: I remember you're a fellow Midtowner, didn't mean to offend by my presumption but I guess I don't run into as many Debbie Downers as you do. Maybe I really am not able to recognize those traits? Either that or I scare them off.

Personally I think a lot of the talented/creative people moving away has to do with the fact that we share a state with two of the greatest cities for entertainment, the arts and culture on the face of the planet. People around the world move to Los Angeles and San Francisco to be part of their creative culture, and it's a lot easier for a Sacramentan to move to one of those cities than someone from, say, Ohio--you don't even need to get a new state ID or pay out-of-state tuition. Trying to directly compare ourselves with LA and SF is never a fair comparison. Cities like Portland and Austin became their respective regions' arts and culture destinations, in part due to the relative lack of other big international cities nearby--they really aren't any bigger than Sacramento, but because they have established themselves as creative hubs, they keep that population instead of having them move quite so easily to California (although I have met more than a few Portland expats here in Sacramento...)

I like the idea of a university in the Railyards, and have discussed the idea on other online forums (you may well have too, under other usernames.) Not where the arena is planned--they have that crammed into a six-acre corner of the Amtrak parking lot, really for no other reason than the city already owns the land (and overpaid through the nose for it.) There is a lot more room in the greater Railyards (north of the relocated tracks) for a university complex--the whole area is around 240 acres, and a lot of it isn't spoken for yet.

Using the proximity of UC Berkeley and UCSF to try and justify another UC isn't that bad an approach, but keep in mind that Berkeley's university came first, and both were established in the 19th Century when California's first generation of millionaires were trying to establish legacies. The UC system, as well as the state of California, is in pretty rough shape these days.

We could always try to secure the legacy of someone local with those bucks, but most of them don't live in Sacramento proper and might be more interested in, say, placing a new university campus on greenfield in return for the right to build even more suburbs on even more greenfield.

Another approach might be to encourage already-extant schools in the Sacramento region to relocate or open new expanded facilities in the Railyards, assuming we can find a way to pay for those facilities--which, as always, is kind of the rub--or, ideally, a new private college of some sort.

In either case, having an actual college campus in the central city would bring focus and attention to the already-present academic community in downtown/midtown. There are already a lot of small campuses in or adjacent to the central city--law schools, graduate programs, satellite campuses--but you generally don't notice them because most just take up a few rooms in an existing office building, with limited traditional "university" facilities, and the students seldom live downtown. There has always been a large number of students in the central city, but they go to Sac State or UCD or Sac City and live downtown because it's a fun place to live if you're in your twenties. There are still some fraternity houses in the central city, which have been around for ages. And of course we already have the coffeehouses and used bookstores of a college town, just without the immediately accessible college.

Another benefit of building a university campus in the Railyards: an undergraduate campus would create a fairly massive demand for dormitory housing, which is high-density and well suited to urban infill, and because students generally don't have high incomes, it could be used for a large proportion of the "low-income" housing component for the Railyards build-out. Students are also ideal "introductory" central city residents: they're generally single, spend money disproportionate to their income, and like late-night and entertainment amenities.

So yeah, I definitely agree that a university in the Railyards would be a far better idea than an arena on top of the Amtrak parking lot. If you're serious about pursuing that effort, Ozone, maybe we should hang out sometime and talk about it.
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Old Posted Dec 29, 2011, 2:49 AM
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I think creating a UC campus at the Railyards would be the best thing we could do. Yeah I know we have UC Davis close by but that's not good enough. Berkeley is also close to San Francisco but it still has it's own UC -including a new UCSF campus @ Mission Bay. I think if spent the money on a new UC branch/campus where the proposed arena would go we'd be much better off in 10-30 years.
I don't see this happening at all. The UC system is in extremely dire financial condition now (http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/...YJP_story.html). The University of California is also focused on continuing to develop its Merced campus, which is one a greenfield site.
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Old Posted Dec 30, 2011, 10:19 PM
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wburg, unfortunately maybe I am exposed to many “debbie downers” and I need to hang out with more positive people! I agree that we have traditionally suffered from being both too close and too far from a city like San Francisco. And I agree with you on Portland, which is Oregon's only real city. Not so much on Austin since Texas has a number of big cities -Houston is the fourth largest in the USA, Dallas (9th), and San Antonio (7th). Even still, I will concede that none would compare to either L.A. or San Francisco. However, I think you hit on our problem when you said, "...because they have established themselves as creative hubs, they keep that population instead of having them move quite so easily“. It is precisely because San Francisco and LA are such well-known commodities (not to mention incredibly expensive) that I think Sacramento now has the ability to become the ‘trendy’ alternative city in California. That is what is most frustrating to me. I see the incredible potential that Sacramento has and lament its lack of imagination and will.

As far as the idea of creating a new university at Railyards. 202_Cyclist I would not get too fixated on the headlines about the current financial state of affairs of the UC system. The UC system will survive and continue to grow. Moreover, I do not think UC Merced has much to do with Sacramento. UC Merced is for the San Joaquin Valley. Besides I was thinking that like UCSF’s new bio-technology campus at Mission Bay, a UC Sacramento could have a narrow academic focus, perhaps green technology, to provide its justification for existence.

I was thinking that it would be easier for the city to donate its property at the Railyards than it would be for private landowners to do so. Once the new intermodal station is completed, the historic train depot could be converted into UC Sacramento’s ‘nucleus’ and additional buildings be incorporated into and built around it. Additional property could be secured nearby for a R&D campus. Maybe in River District or that 240 acres you talked about. I could see the entire Railyards Project Area being built as a model for green urban infill with the help of the university. As you mentioned, one of benefit of building a university campus in the Railyards would the demand for housing for facility and students. Yes wburg I would like to hang-out and talk about it sometime. I think we agree far more than we disagree.

Because of the large numbers of renters (transient tenants), absentee landlords and non-resident business owners in the Central City there is less incentive for the shareholders to work for the amenities and make changes we need. So I am starting a meet-up group in the spring with the hope of bringing creative urban-oriented residents together in order to help identify what changes need to be made and come up with resident-generated solutions to the problems. I’ll be in Asia for most of February so I hope to start that up in March.
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Old Posted Dec 31, 2011, 12:00 AM
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Speaking of the economic effect of universities, here's a timely story from the Bee:

http://www.sacbee.com/2011/12/30/415...estimated.html
Quote:
UC Davis' impact on area estimated at $5.3 billion
By Darrell Smith The Sacramento Bee
Copyright 2011 The Sacramento Bee. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

The economic impact of the University of California, Davis, campus on the Sacramento and Northern California region totaled $5.3 billion in 2009-2010, according to an independent report released today.The report, "Economic Impacts of UC Davis," by the Sacramento-based Center for Strategic Economic Research, covers the impacts of the academic institution, excluding its medical facilities. It says UCD contributed:
• More than 48,000 direct and indirect jobs;
• $1.8 billion in employee salaries, wages and benefits;
• Another $3.5 billion in goods and services.

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2011/12/30/415...#storylink=cpy
$5.3 billion--not counting the additional $4.5 billion of the UC Davis medical center and health system! Compare that to the projected (and, in my opinion, overly sunny) arena economic effect of $1 billion. "Eds and meds" are almost a cliche as economic generators, but while we have a lot of "meds" (and note that a lot of the current office construction in Midtown is related to Sutter's expansion) but not very many "eds."

However, we do have a lot of small campuses in just the right places, and some are looking to expand. University of the Pacific has talked about expanding its Sacramento presence--they already have McGeorge School of Law in Oak Park, and might be interested in a downtown Sacramento campus. Maybe in the Railyards, or in another city-owned building, like the Plaza Building/RCA Building/Biltmore Hotel at 10th and J? That would put the campus right at the heart of downtown, with close access to major libraries, and a lot of amenities college students appreciate (cheap lunch places and nightlife!) Plus it could turn Cesar Chavez Plaza into a "university quad" atmosphere, and provide energy on a stretch of J Street that is as desperately in need of help as the worst parts of K Street. And nobody can claim that University of the Pacific, whose main campus is in Stockton with a new dental campus in San Francisco and McGeorge in Oak Park, would be hesitant to invest in a Central Valley city, a struggling neighborhood or an urban core!

About the city land in the Railyards: The historic depot is actually going to be part of the new intermodal depot, it will not be abandoned once the tracks are relocated. Once the tracks are moved, the total amount of space for a new depot is pretty much exactly the same amount of space as Los Angeles' union station--and guess what, LA's union station is the only Amtrak depot west of the Mississippi busier than Sacramento's, so we could certainly use a newly expanded depot of comparable size!

But remember, Inland is looking for something to do with their property. A facility like a university would answer a lot of pending questions for them.

Midtown does have a lot of renters (something like 85%) but a lot are long-term renters who really care about the community. Getting them to attend public meetings is another matter. Landlords like to rent their units, and an influx of college students would create more demand for housing and better utilize the existing building stock. As to business interests, there are two business improvement districts in the central city, and I think both of them would pretty much salivate at the thought of a few thousand college students spending money in their members' businesses!

As to the whole creative question--I think I just get bubbly these days because I see an amazing amount of new creativity going on--it seems like there's a new art gallery, theater, live music venue, cafe, or store featuring local crafts/products/food opening every week in Midtown/Downtown, and planning one's social calendar now generally means having to pick which of several interesting events one wishes to attend, even on weeknights. Add to that the fact that even a lot of expatriate artists, actors and musicians are far more likely to give Sacramento credit as they tour the country than they used to be, and the long-time image (false, but widely believed) of Sacramento as a black hole for creativity becomes harder and harder to maintain.
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Old Posted Dec 31, 2011, 2:21 PM
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Join Date: May 2004
Location: Sacramento California
Posts: 2,270
^^^ Your points are all well taken. A couple of thoughts. My understanding was that the new station was going to be set up against the relocated tracks so how are they going to combine the new and the old? That seems like an awkward arrangement. I know there was talk of moving the old depot but I don't see that happening.

While it's true that there are lots of renters who care about what goes on in their neighborhood and lots of creative people living in the Central City there exists two classic problems of economics and poltical influence involved in a high percentage of renters and absentee landlords. But I can't really go into depth about that here. Also when I use the word "creative" I'm not necessarily referring to artists but to a general way thinking.

Re. UC - I am just throwing an idea out there. I am not one who thinks since the city already has a plan for this or that we must accept it. There are shelves filled with plans and proposals that went nowhere; a lot of money, energy and hoopla went into each of those dead ideas. I'm not married to any single idea. Part of having a creative mind is having a plastic or open mind. And who knows how one person's idea can spark the imagination of another? Someone first got into to their head that an arena at the Railyards would be a good idea even though I believe it's an unfortunate one. But that's the nature of things- all around us are examples of both good and bad ideas realized.
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