Downtown Plaza in Sac- What on earth is happening?? (Sacramento: crime, landscaping)

[redwoodlvr]

Ah maybe just don't go to the mall? Shop on-line or go hiking instead. hehe

I drove through there the other day and it's pretty bad. I lived here in the late 80's as well, don't remember if it was developed yet at the time, but Macy's was there and the area was okay. Personally I just won't venture down there and I don't shop anyway, lol.

Yeah those people in the ghetto really make life suck for everyone else huh?? Let's drop the coding and just say brown and black people eh? Most of these people are kids having to live in desperate, unimaginable survival and resorting to crime just to put bread on the table for their families. I'm not making excuses or condoning violence, just raising awareness. Not everyone in an underpriviledged area is a criminal or out to lower the standards of an area. They're for the most part trying to get the hell out, but either they don't know how (generational poverty), come from abusive/drug addicted households or they have very limited options otherwise.

And those damn rich and greedy Bay Area transplant bastards causing housing problems and blowing up the economy all over the country, they're just as bad! It makes me laugh when I hear this because I'm just making ends meet just like the rest of us and I lived in the Bay Area for years.

If the powers that be wanted to clean up the Downtown/K Street Mall area, believe me they'd do it in a heartbeat. Somebody is making money off of it's deterioration, how much you wanna bet? Exactly the same folks who want the "ghetto people" to remain in dire straits, impoverished and separated in my opinion.

If you really want to make a difference, get in their face and raise community awareness, make it known you have to drive 20-30 miles out of the way and refuse to shop there at all. Get people to stop shopping there. If you don't want to get involved, complaining about it isn't going to change anything so why waste your energy?

[looking4home]

Uh, cityx, have you visited the Vermont forum recently? There's a lot of discussion about Burlington and how it's gone "ghetto". Now, ghetto for Vermont and ghetto for California are obviously two different things, but it still would be a good idea to check out these posts and find out what people who actually live there are saying. Apparently, the North End is pretty scary now, complete with gang activity. Those who have lived in urban areas like Chicago said they wouldn't venture there after dark.

Every large town or city has its problems now. With the mobile society we live in, gangstas or the wannabes from neighboring states or towns will migrate to a new place they feel will be of benefit to them, either socially or monetarily. Unfortunately, the monetarily part too often involves illegal activity.

[mikefarinha]

I wonder if this has anything to do with opening up the (fairly) new lightrail station down in Meadowview?

[CityGirl72]

They put light rail in Meadowview!!!!!!???????

Don't we have enough crap-ola people that ride that thing??? Geez - good planning Metro Transit

[bigtallredhead]

Originally Posted by redwoodlvr

Yeah those people in the ghetto really make life suck for everyone else huh?? Let's drop the coding and just say brown and black people eh? Most of these people are kids having to live in desperate, unimaginable survival and resorting to crime just to put bread on the table for their families. I'm not making excuses or condoning violence, just raising awareness. Not everyone in an underpriviledged area is a criminal or out to lower the standards of an area. They're for the most part trying to get the hell out, but either they don't know how (generational poverty), come from abusive/drug addicted households or they have very limited options otherwise.

And those damn rich and greedy Bay Area transplant bastards causing housing problems and blowing up the economy all over the country, they're just as bad! It makes me laugh when I hear this because I'm just making ends meet just like the rest of us and I lived in the Bay Area for years.

If the powers that be wanted to clean up the Downtown/K Street Mall area, believe me they'd do it in a heartbeat. Somebody is making money off of it's deterioration, how much you wanna bet? Exactly the same folks who want the "ghetto people" to remain in dire straits, impoverished and separated in my opinion.

Really, it's NOT just lower class "black and brown people" that was being referred to. -In Sacramento the "ghetto people" also means a lot of white trash, and even many Asians to boot. Really just lowlifes of all races, but not middle class or respectable working class/poor people of any color.

And yes there are many respectable people who do live in the ghetto, including plenty of poor people who are not into committing crime, -I didn't read anyone say anything to contradict that. I think there is a big difference between committing crime truly to survive (which is the exception) vs. becuase of envy or greed, or just for the fun of it. The latter is dominant as far as crime goes, and is by know means limited to the poor or too the ghetto. A lot of poor people of all races struggle but act respectable, -the majority in fact, even in the ghetto, so that is no excuse for thuggery. I grew up in the ghetto and still have many friends there, and still live in a lower income area myself, BTW.

Those who rich and greedy DO indeed cause a lot of problems, though those two things do not always go together. But a lot of transplant from the bay area are not like that, -many have moved trying to find a cheaper place to live becuase they struggled to much economically in the bay area, and are far from rich.

[NewToCA]

Significant new development concerning Downtown Plaza. It appears that Westfields has finally gotten serious about redeveloping this large decaying downtown shopping plaza, and has submitted specific plans to the city. Construction may begin before the end of this year:

http://www.cityofsacramento.org/dsd/...eldDTPlaza.pdf

cbs13.com - Big Plans To Update Sac. Downtown Plaza (http://cbs13.com/local/downtown.plaza.sacramento.2.648020.html - broken link)

[cityx]

This is fascinating and very exciting!
Hopefully, Westfield will follow through on this. I think most people around Downtown have lost faith in their ownership of the Plaza.

[NewToCA]

I think that the refocus towards a large local shopping center gives it a much higher probability of actually happening. The expansion is fairly small, with a majority of the effort on updating, expanding and moving the food court, adding restaurants, adding a Target and a supermarket (I understand Nugget was interested). They are currently negotiating leases, so it shouldn't take long.

I think two things make this more likely than past proposals, first is the scaling back of the redesign to not be a regional draw (more for local residents) and the probability of the Railyards project becoming a major retail draw and competitor. I think Westfields realized they need to partner with K St merchants, and play connect the dots between K St, the Capital and Old Town Sacramento to be part of that competition with the Railyards.

New development phase of downtown should be interesting, a lot of smaller stuff is starting to fall into place.

[CityGirl72]

Kick A$$ - makes moving back even better

)I'm still working on it)

[NewToCA]

Originally Posted by CityGirl72

Kick A$$ - makes moving back even better

)I'm still working on it)

If you succeed (and I really hope you do) I think you will find that action is actually finally taking place on the Railyards, K St and DTP. They had to change their focus and get more realistic about what could be developed and sustainable, but it appears reality is setting in.

As you know, the Towers, Aura, Bookloft and Epic all got kicked aside this past year, and doom and gloom set in for development. However, I think that getting this stuff going first will enhance the attraction of actually living downtown, and then we'll see some of the high rise living spaces built, perhaps in 3-5 years as a starting point.

You need to make living downtown more desirable before making plans for grand residential towers. They seem to finally be "getting it".