Key to livable suburbs may be more foot traffic

By Stuart Leavenworth
Bee Staff Writer
(Published Nov. 21, 1999)

Ever wonder why some subdivisions are virtual ghost towns for pedestrians? For Anne Geraghty, it's no mystery at all. In Sacramento and elsewhere, decades of zoning have resulted in homogenous pods of housing, offices and shopping, all of which are separate from each other. Residential streets are lined with sidewalks, but they inevitably lead to a wall of traffic.

"A lot of these subdivisions have nice houses, but they don't lead anywhere," said Geraghty, who heads WalkSacramento, a fledgling group that seeks to make the region more foot-friendly. "At the end of the road is a busy highway, and that can be a pretty scary place."

In Sacramento's ongoing debate over sprawl, many have argued that the region needs more planning. But for years, most of Sacramento's new suburbs have been extensively planned, and the end product is a segmented landscape, divided by multilane thoroughfares, where automobiles rule the road.

Academics have a stock phrase -- "separation of uses" -- to describe this pattern. The trend picked up steam after World War II, when developers started mass production of houses, and neighborhood associations multiplied. In turn, homeowners pushed for zoning to ward off other large-scale developments, such as apartment complexes and shopping centers. Many credit these zoning rules for creating quiet, safe suburbs where families don't have to worry about noisy nightclubs or the bright lights of used car lots. "To some degree, it is a preference of people," said Patty Dunn, planning director in Roseville, the region's fastest-growing city. "In the suburbs, people are looking for a different lifestyle than you find in a city."

If so, such preferences are adding to the region's problems, say critics of the segmented metropolis. Some blame zoning for dividing communities by income, with affluent people in one place, less wealthy residents in another.

At the very least, the separation of jobs, homes and retail complicates the task of walking, biking or using transit, forcing people to drive for even a quart of milk.

"The thing people want most in a community is quiet, safe streets," said Paul Zykofsky of the Center for Livable Communities, a Sacramento group that assists local governments. "But with the conventional model, all the traffic is funneled to the surrounding arterials. As you get more traffic, these roadways get more strip development."

Local data confirm that Sacramento households are driving more with each year.

In 1997, for example, households in Sacramento were averaging 11 car trips every weekday, a 5 percent increase over 1990 levels. In Roseville, a typical household takes about 13 car trips a day, according to surveys by the Sacramento Area Council of Governments.

"Obviously this is of great concern to us," said Ron Maertz, an analyst with the Sacramento Metropolitan Air Quality Management District. Not only is the region adding more people, he said, but those people are driving more and adding to the total emissions that cause ozone smog.

To be sure, subdivision design is just one reason for people's free-wheeling ways. In some households, people are now holding down two or three jobs, forcing them to drive more. Others don't want to walk or bike because of concerns about crime. Others can't walk because of health conditions.

Even so, the spread-out, detached configuration of new communities isn't making it easier for willing pedestrians. In a recent report, the Surface Transportation Policy Project found that California's highest pedestrian accident rates were in "in newer, sprawling communities," including those in Sacramento and Placer counties.

"These are communities where restrictive local zoning codes often mandate the separation of shops, schools, businesses and houses," said the report. "It is exactly these types of physical environments . . . that appear to be some of the most dangerous places for pedestrians."

Although unaware of the study, one Sacramento planner acknowledged that local walkers and bikers face some challenges here.

"Generally speaking, we have a long history of designing projects that aren't that friendly to pedestrians," said Trish Stevens, Sacramento County's principal planner. "We are trying to change that."

Laguna West, she said, is one development that incorporates shopping, parks and a community center into its layout. Another is east Elk Grove, now under construction, which will have streets leading to a village center, she said.

Such changes can't come fast enough for some local residents, such as Wayne and Grace Holloway, residents of Rocklin.

In July, the Holloways were crossing at an unsignaled crosswalk in Roseville when a motorist sped through the intersection, hitting Wayne Holloway and flipping him over the car.

Holloway -- a leader of the Placer Pacers, a local walking group -- survived but suffered four cracked ribs, a gash on his head and other injuries.

"People who drive cars just don't pay attention," said Grace Holloway, who says her 62-year-old husband is still recovering. "They just talk on their cell phones and listen to the radio and don't notice anyone around them."

To minimize such accidents, WalkSacramento is urging local governments to adopt several safety measures: Crossing signals, planted medians and buffers of vegetation to separate sidewalks from speeding cars. In new subdivisions, the group would like to see narrower streets and smaller grids of street blocks.

Even with these modifications, Geraghty says people won't walk if they don't have destinations, such as neighborhood grocery stores, shops, parks or community centers they can easily reach on foot.

"Walkers want a lot of variety and stimulation," said Geraghty. "If you don't have that, you don't want to walk."

Perhaps, but building true mixed-use communities isn't so easy, said Tom DiGiovanni,a Chico developer who is now building several neotraditional subdivisions. A major problem, he said, is the mind-set of people in the development community.

"The first hurdle is to rethink the conventional," said DiGiovanni. "As a professional class, developers have adopted a set way of doing things. We don't often want to examine the alternatives."

True "mixed-use" development faces other obstacles, he said. These include:

Building codes, which often force builders to comply with two or three different standards when building a mix of housing, shops and offices.

Traffic engineers and fire departments that often require wide streets and multilane thoroughfares even in the smallest of subdivisions.

National retail trends, in which people are buying from catalogs and big-box retailers instead of patronizing neighborhood stores.

"There are only so many corner stores you can add to a project," said DiGiovanni. "These kind of stores are not going to replace the big box."

The city of Davis recently tangled over this issue. Neighborhood groups wanted to block the Nugget grocery chain from nearly doubling the size of an existing 25,000-square-foot food store, fearing it would displace other groceries.

After an extensive debate, Nugget is going ahead with the expansion.

Despite some compromises, Davis leaders say their planning principles have resulted in the region's most walkable community, partly because homes, shops and jobs are all close to each other.

"I can't tell you that people don't use their cars here. They do," said Bill Emlen, Davis' planning and building director. "But the city has taken a strong stance on maintaining a compact form, and that has paid off."

Geraghty, who helped found WalkSacramento two years ago, is hopeful that other communities are becoming sensitive to pedestrian concerns.

She became active after moving from east Sacramento to Fair Oaks to be closer to the American River. She and her husband love their neighborhood, she said, but can't easily walk or bike because of the design of the surrounding roads and subdivisions, including some new gated communities.

"Sometimes, when I see what is happening out there, I just want to cry," said Geraghty. "But I've lived long enough to see things change in one way, so I know that things can change back. That keeps me going."