Proposal to rename 12th/14th from Franklin to Power Inn (Sacramento: house, neighborhood)

[SacramentoBound]

Anybody else get this letter in the past week? I am interested to hear the opinions of people who have been in the area longer than we have. I pass by the church and family life center all the time but I haven't heard about any of the things in the letter. To be honest, the neighborhood does not seem much improved by having a multi-million-dollar church facility in the middle. Was it that much worse before?

[Majin]

No thanks.

And even if they did change the name, why stop at franklin blvd? just rename the entire street. I find it pretty stupid when the same segment of road changes names multiple times for no reason. Especially in the case where sutterville rd is a discontinuous street.

[Lillp]

I think that they mean well, but as a resident of Oak Park the only change I can directly tie the St. Paul's expansion is an increase in congestion on 12th/14th Avenue in the early afternoon on Sundays. I'm actually pretty surprised that they were able to put in a new building and additional parking without fully mitigating for the traffic impacts to the adjacent residential communities.
As for the name change, the grid system is shaky at best in Oak Park so, as Majin mentioned, why not just rename the whole street if you are going to rename it at all? If the church would like to bear the costs, fine, but I don't see that as really being an important issues and don’t think that residents or tax payers should bear any of the costs.
[SIZE=3] [/SIZE]

[caligirlz]

I don't live in that area, but I DO agree with majin.

[jbmcd]

Personally, I think all street renamings should be required to:

1) Be approved by all, or at least a great majority, of the owners of property with addresses on that street. They are the ones who will have to deal with the confusion, address changes, directions, etc. If those pushing the renaming want to offer assistance to the other addressees to help get that approval, great.

2) Be given a single, simple official name. In this day and age, addresses get looked up on computer databases for many purposes, and there's often an assumption that if it can't be found, that you must live elsewhere. Do I start entering "Dr. Ephraim Williams Street" starting with a "D" for Dr.? Or do I look it up under "E" for Ephraim", or "W" because the last name is Williams? Do some systems expand the Dr. to "Drive" and then drop the rest because it's at the beginning? If I enter "Doctor", will it fail? If the pizza place, or the UPS guy, or the mail order house in Nebraska can't find it, things get dropped and lost. Not worth it -- require the name to be simply "Williams Street" or similar.

3) Funding for all agencies to coordinate must be available, provided by the parties pushing for the change. Caltrans refused to change signs for "Army Street" in SF for years to "Cesar E Chavez Blvd" or whatever the exact variant is. That just compounds the misery of those trying to get packages, give directions.

4) In general, I wouldn't rename an existing street after a living person (I don't necessarily have a problem with a developer naming their streets after themselves before people move in). What happens 5 years down the line when this person is embroiled in a scandal and having a street named after them is highly inappropriate? Honor people after death if necessary.

[Majin]

Actually I have a better proposal:



How about we rename the entire section of road 12th ave (from freeport onward) and remove the stupid S turn and reconnect the street to the rest of 12th ave (along with reconnecting all of the adjacent streets). Rename 14th ave to Ephraim ave or Williams ave.

[SacramentoBound]

I agree that if the goal is simplification, the continuous section of road goes from Land Park to somewhere past Power Inn. Renaming just a middle section means you took a section of road with count 'em: 1, 2, 3 names and changed the 2nd name and one of its endpoints.

Google Maps seems to think there is already a Williams Ave in Sacramento? At least it takes me to a neighborhood and points to a house, but I don't see the street anywhere. I think I would be more comfortable with a shorter version, like Williams Ave. It doesn't say as much "this street belongs to St. Paul's." There are a few other churches on this stretch of road, and although I would hope they all have a good relationship with each other, it seems like it would be especially awkward for them.

[Mr. Opinionated]

Originally Posted by caligirlz

I don't live in that area, but I DO agree with majin.

Neither do I and also agree. I was puzzled and annoyed when I first arrived here in 2003, and saw that the big street south of Florin Rd. had three names! Or how another wide one like Calvine just ends at a huge field? Oh I'm sure there are rationalizations for these oddities. And they appear more so compared to where I grew up. But then if a road or boulevard is continuous, seems it's name should be also.

[Majin]

Originally Posted by Mr. Opinionated

Neither do I and also agree. I was puzzled and annoyed when I first arrived here in 2003, and saw that the big street south of Florin Rd. had three names! Or how another wide one like Calvine just ends at a huge field? Oh I'm sure there are rationalizations for these oddities. And they appear more so compared to where I grew up. But then if a road or boulevard is continuous, seems it's name should be also.

Two words:

Sacramento County

Worst urban planning in the history of the world. Do they even have a urban planner employed in that organization? If so, he should be fired by Gov Brown and his license revoked. That board should of been dissolved and the rest of the county annexed into nearby cities 30 years ago. They are pretty much solely responsible for all the randomness in the street system here and all of the leap frog development.

Just look at their RECENTLY approved Cordova Hills Project.... good lord, if that isn't the definition of leapfrog sprawl, I don't know what is. Now that housing developments are finally starting to go up, Sacramento County is back to it's old tricks in full force

[u225615]

Originally Posted by Majin

Two words:

Sacramento County

Worst urban planning in the history of the world. Do they even have a urban planner employed in that organization? If so, he should be fired by Gov Brown and his license revoked. That board should of been dissolved and the rest of the county annexed into nearby cities 30 years ago. They are pretty much solely responsible for all the randomness in the street system here and all of the leap frog development.

Just look at their RECENTLY approved Cordova Hills Project.... good lord, if that isn't the definition of leapfrog sprawl, I don't know what is. Now that housing developments are finally starting to go up, Sacramento County is back to it's old tricks in full force

I agree with you in your description of the inadequacies of Sacramento County and it would be beneficial if the rest of it were annexed by nearby cities. I imagine there is a smokey, dimly lit room behind the board chambers equipped with darts and a dart board used to make "planning" decisions.