Sacramento Proposal/Approval/Construction Thread - III

[BillSimmons]

I like how you use 2007 as tour starting point with regards to the development of the rail yard to compare it to the development of the bridge district. Yes, 1993 was 14 years before 2007. That certainly does make it sound like Sacramento has done a lot of work in very little time!

Of course, as usual, that's not even close to the truth. If you want to pretend like they started developing the railyard 8 years ago that's fine, but in reality it's been more like 68 years! And still, to this day, there's not a single person that lives in the redeveloped downtown railyard.

And West Sac isn't JUST NOW starting to make progress, either! Raley Field broke ground in 1999 and was completed and hosting professional baseball games in 2000. That was 15 years ago, and only 7 years after the Bridge District plan that you just cited from 1993.

So in reality, it took 7 years for West Sac to clean up their toxic riverfront to the point where they completed a baseball stadium, and closer to 70 years since Sacramento closed up shop in our railyard (which is a HUGE chunk of land, right next to downtown), and all they have done is build some streets and a couple bridges. And they just now finished that.

It's amazing what twisting the truth to meet your narrative can do for an argument.

I also like how you mention the size of the cities in question as if that makes a difference. Yes, Sacramento is 10x bigger than West Sacramento. Yes, the Bridge District takes up a larger chunk of the total land area of the city of Weat Sac than the railyard does of Sacramento. But why would that somehow make TBD more relevant? The railyard is a huge chunk of the central part of the Capitol of the largest state in America. A city of 500,000 people, center of a metropolitan area of 2.5 million, has a huge toxic dump right in the heart of the city. Everybody that visits here that flies into the airport has to pass that huge empty —. That looks horrible. One of the biggest gripes I hear from out-of-tower's is about that goddam railyard. That is a site of much higher value than TBD. The land is worth more, it's much higher profile.

The stark contrast of the size of the cities also makes it more pathetic that West Sac is so much further along than Sacramento. We have a much larger tax base, much larger corporate base. There should be a much higher demand for development in the railyard than for TBD, and yet there's people living in TBD right now and we're still years away from that on our side of the river.

There's no excuse. Any way you put it, Sacramwnto is getting crushed in the gettin-—-done department by our formerly-forgotten sister city from the other side of the river, that happens to be 1/10th our size.

[Majin]

wburg is full of — for the most part, but a large part of the problem with the railyards was indeed it was owned by a large bankrupt owner in which a arena potentially in the railyard was in flux for a decade+ while the magoofs secretly tried to get out of town. The entire TDB district never had nearly the problems the railyard had over the past 2 decades.

Not giving the city of Sacramento a pass on this, but the railyward vs the TDB is vastly different.

[wburg]

BillSimmons: The Railyards were still in use as railyards until the 1990s--the statement that the Railyards "closed up shop" 68 years ago is simply untrue. There were major operations taking place there through the 1980s, and many of the facilities were still in use for another decade, when Southern Pacific sold to Union Pacific, who moved the remaining operations to Roseville.

The extent of toxic cleanup was much larger, too--most of West Sacramento's industrial base cleaned up for the Bridge district was things like rice mills, box manufacturing and vegetable warehouses, while the Railyards were real heavy industry--foundries, metalwork, locomotive manufacturing, huge quantities of metal scrap and coal and oil and ash dumped into a swamp over the course of more than a century. All in all, a bigger and more complex job. If the Railyards were in West Sacramento they wouldn't be as far along as we are now. And plenty of other major American cities with large industrial facilities have exactly the same sort of brownfields. Some are farther along with their restoration/renovation of those places, some less far along.

Belittling and insulting Sacramento's efforts, despite greater obstacles and unavoidable pitfalls, doesn't make West Sacramento stand any taller. And it conveniently ignores all the other work that is getting done throughout the city--keep in mind that the Railyards isn't our only brownfield.

There were earlier plans, like the Roma plan, to convert the railyards, but the property wasn't sold so those plans were never formally approved--and, again, they were still being used as railyards during the Roma plan era!

[mt_climber13]

Does anybody know what is going on at the I-5 southbound/ 50 interchange at Old Sac? Lanes have been closed down and looks like a canopy of steel is creeping out over the freeway- are they decking 5??

[fouroheight68]

Originally Posted by wburg

I'm not familiar with this "Sacramento Preservation Society" of which you speak.

He is referring to Preservation Sacramento - it is a local organization dedicated to protecting Sacramento's historic places and encouraging quality urban design through advocacy, outreach, and activism

[SacTownAndy]

Originally Posted by wakamesalad

Does anybody know what is going on at the I-5 southbound/ 50 interchange at Old Sac? Lanes have been closed down and looks like a canopy of steel is creeping out over the freeway- are they decking 5??

No, it's a new entrance into Old Town from Capitol Mall:

http://sacramentocityexpress.com/2015/06...or-to-provide-new-entrance-into-old-sac/

[mt_climber13]

Originally Posted by SacTownAndy

No, it's a new entrance into Old Town from Capitol Mall:

http://sacramentocityexpress.com/2015/06...or-to-provide-new-entrance-into-old-sac/

Thanks.. dreams dashed! lol.

On another note, CR Blvd. has just opened between I-5 and Franklin Blvd., making it way easier for me to get to school No more Crack Rd. for me.

[NickB1967]

Originally Posted by wakamesalad

Thanks.. dreams dashed! lol.

While it would be hundreds of millions of dollars to effectively "roof" the depressed part of Interstate 5, the new entrance overpass road for Old Sacramento will at least be a step in that direction, reducing freeway noise along that part of 2nd street in Old Sacramento.

[snfenoc]

Good news for downtown? Brown's budget includes a huge new office building
Ben van der Meer
Staff Writer
Sacramento Business Journal

Gov. Jerry Brown's proposed budget for next year has good news for downtown Sacramento: $1.5 billion in new construction for state agencies. Much of that money could end up in the city's core, where many state agencies are headquartered.

Topping the list is a proposed 650,000-square-foot office building to eventually house about 2,800 state employees currently in the state Resource Building and Bonderson buildings downtown. The proposed building would be considerably larger than the Wells Fargo Center on Capitol Mall....

For more of the article CLICK HERE


CLICK HERE for a more extensive article from the Sacramento Bee.

[Pistola916]

Originally Posted by snfenoc

Good news for downtown? Brown's budget includes a huge new office building
Ben van der Meer
Staff Writer
Sacramento Business Journal



For more of the article CLICK HERE

650,000 square feet is significant, roughly 40-50 story building. Sadly, we'll probably see landscrapers.

[Majin]

Originally Posted by Pistola916

650,000 square feet is significant, roughly 40-50 story building. Sadly, we'll probably see landscrapers.

Well, the good news here is that the article says they want them near the capital but there is no where to put a landscraper downtown.

[Pistola916]

Originally Posted by Majin

Well, the good news here is that the article says they want them near the capital but there is no where to put a landscraper downtown.

The railyards is near the capitol

[Majin]

Originally Posted by Pistola916

The railyards is near the capitol

There is zero chance city allows the state to take over a large part of that land to create a landscraper. If Fargo was still mayor, yes, that would likely happen. Not with KJ and his legacy at stake with the Arena/MLS Stadium/10000 housing units downtown.

[creamcityleo79]

I'm optimistic about this. Jerry Brown cares about Sacramento and our state's urban cores and he has a stake in this. I hope this happens! Very exciting!

[Pistola916]

Originally Posted by Majin

There is zero chance city allows the state to take over a large part of that land to create a landscraper. If Fargo was still mayor, yes, that would likely happen. Not with KJ and his legacy at stake with the Arena/MLS Stadium/10000 housing units downtown.

Well anything less than a high rise would be a major disappointment. The state has a chance to develop an iconic building with the amount of square feet their proposing.

Remember The Golden State Tower proposal . Something like that better be envisioned

[wburg]

650,000 square feet is maybe a 7 story building occupying a whole city block, or 15 stories or so on a half-block.

I imagine they would probably put it where the building sometimes called the "Bunker" is located between 7th, 8th, N and O Street, in fact it was vacated in anticipation of the "West End Complex" office tower plan until the more recent fiscal unpleasantness. The state also owns all the surface parking lots along O Street between 7th and 14th, including at least one full city block and several half-blocks, either of which could be the destination for this building. Presumably they'd then fix up the vacated buildings and repopulate them later, or sell them? Tough to say in the long run.

Looks like the financing method they're using would mean the possibility of ground floor retail in those buildings, rather than a strictly state building that goes dead at 5 PM.

[enigma99a]

Originally Posted by wburg

650,000 square feet is maybe a 7 story building occupying a whole city block, or 15 stories or so on a half-block.

Wells Fargo is about 500,000 and I'm not sure about the US Bank tower but 15 stories seems a little low. Didn't the original Golden State tower call for like 1.5 million sqft and it was 50 stories. So that would make it at least 25

[wburg]

The four buildings of the East End complex includes about 2 million square feet on about 4 city blocks total, CalPERS' two-block office complex on Q Street is close to 600,000. I think for taller buildings you lose some square footage per floor as the building generally gets narrower at the top. Each Sacramento city block is 320x320 feet, so that's a bit over 100,000 square feet per block. Generally even a building that takes up the whole block doesn't cover 100% of the block, so 7 stories would be an absolute minimum (100,000x7 or 50,000x15=700-750,000 sf). It depends--building tall gets more expensive, and Brown is a fiscally prudent guy. People build up because the land is expensive, and the state of California bought that land 50 years ago at fire-sale prices.

[creamcityleo79]

Originally Posted by wburg

The four buildings of the East End complex includes about 2 million square feet on about 4 city blocks total, CalPERS' two-block office complex on Q Street is close to 600,000. I think for taller buildings you lose some square footage per floor as the building generally gets narrower at the top. Each Sacramento city block is 320x320 feet, so that's a bit over 100,000 square feet per block. Generally even a building that takes up the whole block doesn't cover 100% of the block, so 7 stories would be an absolute minimum (100,000x7 or 50,000x15=700-750,000 sf). It depends--building tall gets more expensive, and Brown is a fiscally prudent guy. People build up because the land is expensive, and the state of California bought that land 50 years ago at fire-sale prices.

But, Brown is also a quality guy. Look at the investment into the governor's mansion. Do you think he did that just so he could live there for a couple years? I think it's about making Sacramento better, in the long run...and he understands a more urban, thriving environment downtown will accomplish that goal. (IMO, of course)

[Mr. Ozo]

Note the Bee article mentions that the current Resources building is 657,000 and 17 stories tall. Its very blocky and takes up a half city block.

Across the street is the "bunker" a whole city block, and next to that is an entire city block of surface parking except for the historic house there.

So the State owns almost two full blocks to work with right next door. Since we are speculating I think this is where they would/should build, which they had plans for back in 2005. The community needs to be advocating that retail and housing be included in the project.



Is it too early to start talking about a condo conversion and re-skin of the current Resources building?