Alleys in Sacramento (condo, new home, neighborhood)

[Bozackin]

I wanted to start a conversation in the hopes of getting opinions and experiences with alley's in Sacramento. Particularly from those who have lived somewhere with alley access. After a year or so of researching Sacramento and spending time in the city, I finally settled on a neighborhood and purchased a home. It is located in the northern tip of the Elmhurst Neighborhood just south of East Sac.

I am quite comfortable with the level of safety where I am at save one detail, the alley access that runs behind the property. I'm curious what problems if any people typically deal with. It's a short little alley that is located off the main thoroughfares so I do not anticipate a lot of foot traffic, but never having lived in a city with so many alley's I'm curious how people generally use them.

I am debating continuing the 6ft fencing in the backyard around to just block off the access completely and adding some privacy lattice for extra height but want to make an informed decision.

Any thoughts are appreciated.

[derekjones]

I haven't owned a home that has alley access and those I know that do live with alley access either live in an apt or condo. First thing you would want to do is check your CC&R's to make sure you are allowed to do that. Sometimes there are restrictions on where you can place your fence and how high it can be.

[wburg]

Elmhurst's CC&Rs probably expired a long time ago and there is no HOA, as it is a century old neighborhood. A 6 or 8 foot backyard fence can be built without even getting a building permit. Is there no fence on the back of your property currently, bozackin? If so, some sort of fence is recommended just for privacy. I live on an alley, my backyard has a 6' fence and the part next to my house has a small picket fence. But I live in Midtown near a few bars so my experience is probably very different from Elmhurst, which is a lot quieter. People use the alleys for their trash bins and some folks build garages on the alley (that requires a permit!) for off-street parking. If it's a neighborhood where street folk travel through you'll find them in the alley looking for recyclables.

[la_cavalière]

I would definitely install a fence along your alley property line - maybe with a gate. All the houses near me with alley access have fences. You will need a permit from the city of Sacramento for a fence higher than 6 feet (including the height with trellis/lattice topper).

Congratulations on your new home! Elmhurst is a beautiful neighborhood.

[xeney]

Yeah, I'd have a fence, but I wouldn't worry too much. We live in midtown and have alley access, and even when we didn't have a fence for a while we didn't have any security problems. We had chain link for a long time and now have a six-foot wooden fence.

Our alley used to be pretty nice, but then the city put a fence across the middle of it (which was unfortunately necessary because it's an unpaved alley and people were using it to skirt the traffic calming, and causing a ton of dust for my neighbors), and ever since then it's been pretty sketchy and dumpy. Homeless people sometimes sleep back there, but they've never caused any serious problems or stayed for long. We have never had anyone come into our yard that way ... except for one young coyote and a neighbor's chihuahua. (Of course, we've always had dogs.)

[Mr. Ozo]

I absolutely hate the gated alley closures, they definitely cause more problems than they solve. They call them temporary, but they always get rubber stamped by the city council for renewal.

[Bozackin]

Thanks for the responses so far!!! Just to clarify there is currently a 6ft redwood fence that runs my property line. However, in one section of it there is a shotty 4ft tall chain link fence installed that swings open. It's sagging and not very secure, it could probably be easily kicked open if one so desired.

Sounds like I'd be able to remove it and just continue the redwood to the edge of my property line without a permit but I'll definitely check on that and any height restrictions before proceeding.

I was wondering what the cities intentions were regarding the gate closures, seems counterproductive to me, but I'll reserve my judgement on that until I've lived here for a while and have become better acquainted with my neighborhood and local city government.

As of now, it seems like only residents use the alley so it shouldn't be an issue.

[wburg]

Generally it is at the request of residents with complaints about traffic through the alley--either homeless traffic, or auto traffic from cars seeking to avoid traffic-calming half street closures. The city also recently changed its maximum fence heights, you can get up to an 8 foot fence without a permit but 6 feet is generally plenty. A wooden gate with an inexpensive padlock is a better visual block for privacy and discouraging unauthorized backyard visitors (at least the lazy ones who don't like jumping over fences.)

[xeney]

Yeah, the neighbors with houses right on the alley asked for the closure, and they were suffering so much from the auto traffic in the alley that we did not oppose it even though we had strong reservations (and it pretty much played out exactly as expected -- the fence became a place to dump old sofas, the absence of traffic made it a place for drug dealers to hang out for a while, and homeless people moved in). It's better now than it used to be, I think because someone built a house back there so there are more eyes on the alley now.

I still hate traffic calming. It has never once made me any calmer.

[NickB1967]

Originally Posted by xeney

Yeah, the neighbors with houses right on the alley asked for the closure, and they were suffering so much from the auto traffic in the alley that we did not oppose it even though we had strong reservations (and it pretty much played out exactly as expected -- the fence became a place to dump old sofas, the absence of traffic made it a place for drug dealers to hang out for a while, and homeless people moved in). It's better now than it used to be, I think because someone built a house back there so there are more eyes on the alley now.

I still hate traffic calming. It has never once made me any calmer.

THIS. The closure and removal of formerly one-way streets in the area will prove disastrous as more housing units are built there. Someone please restore E, F, G, H, S, T and part of P and Q Streets to their former flowing glory.