Connecting Howe Avenue Safety and Mobility Plan: Public Draft

Another brand new plan from the City of Sacramento that is already behind best practices from other cities. If we are going to spend all of this time and money redesigning these roads, we need to really transform them, not just tweak things around the edges. This road is one of the most dangerous in the city because the original design was terrible--NOT because it was almost right and just needs a few small changes.

As above, please find a way to have trees on both sides of the road. Pedestrian infrastructure without shade in Sacramento is seasonally unusable.

Again, trees should be on both sides of the street. The narrower roadway may make this a challenge but pedestrians will not be able to safely use the sidewalk in summer without shade.

Allowing cycling on only one side of the road for such a high-speed and dangerous road creates another huge barrier to cycling connectivity. What is the plan if cyclists need to travel West from this trail? There should be a protected option on both sides. As I noted in my other comment, a lane removal should be reconsidered if there is not enough space.

To meet the city's goals for climate and tree canopy, we need to be maximizing every opportunity to add trees. Adding trees will also have a traffic calming effect, improving safety, as well as protecting pedestrians and nearby property owners from danger. If the road does not have enough space for this, then a lane reduction should be reconsidered. The traffic flow benefits of the third lane are questionable anyway due to the narrowing to two lanes on the bridge. Adding trees on only one side of the road is an incomplete solution to the problems we face.

In the future could the city please also post a basic PDF of these plans so folks can download and read them on their own computer?

Konveio is great for comments but some functionality is broken (e.g. full-screen on Firefox) and PDF would be generally easier and hopefully not a big lift.

Thanks!

If you are not placing bike lanes on both sides of the roadway, then you should compensate for this by designing every intersection for bike access to this new shared bike path. College Town Dr (Sac state access) has no shown access to the new shared bike path.

Instead of purchasing right-of-way land to place a 2way bike path outside the current roadway, make the outside lane a shared use lane for bikes, right turning cars, and other micro mobility users - on both sides of the roadway.

Why put in a long sidewalk segment at Swarthmore if it just stops at the University overpass? Either stop it at the new bus stop at Swarthmore or show a connection to University Ave below with stairs or a ramp and have it continue to the river crossing.

This section of the redesign does NOT need a 2 way shared bike path. This section should have bike lanes and sidewalks on both sides of the road and should match every other bike pathway design in the city/county - for consistency.

Decreasing car lanes ( p 5) is a bad idea. It will cause more traffic congestion and increase, rather than decrease, accident potential.

Imagery like this is incredibly helpful for understanding the problem of safe transport as a pedestrian or cyclist. Expanding on this further and including less textual elements and including more 2D and especially 3D elements would likely increase community comprehension and community involvement. On the actual aspect of design, I would also like to see some sort of hard barrier to protect pedestrians and cyclists. While I do appreciate the addition of added space between cars and pedestrians I would like to see a physical barrier protecting others from any stray cars that might wander onto the sidewalk.

Alternative 1 would be a grave mistake. The current 5 food bike lane is deadly, but Alternative 1 would force bike user to either diver 10+ minutes, ride on the sidewalk, or still ride in the right lane with the risk of getting hit. Keep bike lanes!

The shared-use path on the eastern cantilever side have a separation barrier between the pedestrians and cyclists, and the roadway traffic. However, on the western side with the pathway, there is no illustration or mentioned separation barrier from the sidewalk users & on the bridge span. Will there be a consideration of a separation barrier on the western side pathway, or will it be exposed to vehicular traffic as like on a standard sidewalk?

I am a Sac State student who regularly commutes to the campus from north of the American River. My commute usually involves taking the onramp that connects southbound Sunrise Boulevard to westbound U.S. 50. At that onramp, which has a pedestrian signal as is proposed here, I have witnessed numerous drivers completely ignore the signal while a pedestrian is supposed to be crossing, forcing them to wait until it is clear. I would be concerned about the same issue here, so I am curious; has there been any consideration of putting a sign before these crosswalks to remind drivers that they must obey the crosswalk signal ahead of them?

Testing

When drivers are merging onto Howe Ave from La Riviera, they are only looking south (left) since this is a one way ramp going north. Drivers have no reason to look south so they will not see cyclists in the shared path heading south. The safer alternative is to end the south bound shared path at the pedestrian path. cyclists can then continue under Howe and up on the west side of the bridge. Then continue the shared path from there to Folsom blvd. This will also prevent cyclists from being on the wrong side of the road going over hwy 50 to folsom blvd.

How will the signals be modified? How will signs enhance safety?

Please consider physical modifications to enhance safety as well. Limiting the number of lanes would be effective.

How is this light operated? If it is for pedestrians and bikes, please place on the near side, and at eye height, adjacent to a bike/pedestrian button. If there is a button, please make it responsive so people will actually use it.

Please consider if the expansion to 3 NB lanes plus left and right turn lanes is really necessary. Keeping the road narrow will help calm traffic and make the crossing safer for pedestrians. Cars change lanes actively at this stretch, seeking to get ahead.

This is far too many lanes! The road is expanding from just two SB lanes to five SB lanes, making this road dangerous to cross for cars and pedestrians alike.

This is still very fast! Especially with pedestrians adjacent to the road.

I hope you will consider *physical* ways to enforce this speed limit, rather than just posted signs and police enforcement. Narrowing lanes, adding slight curves, etc.

This is a very important addition.

I am heartened to see the crosswalk and added shared use path.

However,that is a very long crosswalk. I hope you will consider widening the sidewalks on the N&S sides of the street to narrow the street. There is also an opportunity to have a raised crosswalk to slow traffic further and prioritize pedestrians.

It seems to me there is an opportunity here to add slight curves in the road to encourage drivers to slow down.

Very glad to see this! Narrowing the road is an important step for safety.

We live in Campus Commons and we like to walk. Going up to Fulton is not too far for us but crossing Howe is plain scary...
In general, I like the plan. Some additional thoughts:
• Traffic enforcement is a key. Sureness of being caught is a greater inducement to follow the law than high fines. We still need to find ways to enforce the traffic laws. Some violate pedestrian right-away, scoff at speed limits, and disregard proper turn rules. The state has camera enforcement study. Some thought should be to incorporate camera enforcement here
• When traffic moving on street comes into a section that has a slower speed, traffic will stack up. So uniform speed limits along Howe in both the city and county are imperative. That means cooperation is needed by both levels of government.
• I visited Amsterdam where was impressed how they have separated, cars, pedestrians and bicycles. Also, the west side of Howe in your plan should have a barrier between cars and the pedestrians like what is done on Watt Ave. when crossing the American River.
• Cameras for enforcing speed laws, proper turns and giving pedestrian their right a since some think traffic laws are something to beat and only advisable. Also, bicycle riders need to follow traffic laws. I frequently riders indifferent to the traffic laws. This week I saw a bicyclist riding the wrong in the fast lane on Howe. When to the corner, he weaved in and out of the stopped
• The on and off ramps in both directions for US 50 are special danger because drivers are not looking for pedestrians or bicyclists while moving at high speeds. Some kind of tunnel or bridging is needed to make it safe. This is common problem throughout the state but we need to find a solution here.
• If I were to use your new system. I would walk under Howe and cross the river on the east side. Again dealing with the ramps from La Rivera and US 50 need improvement.
• Wheelchairs should also be able to move along this route safely.
• The bus stop on east side of Swarthmore Drive and Howe should be set back form the street to make it safer for anyone standing there. I prefer to go to American River Drive which is the next stop because there is less traffic and I can get away from the street. It is also shady there on hot days.

Could a the shared path be added on the West Side of Howe from College town to Folsom Blvd? Coming from the north, you could then roll off of the bridge at the Parkway on the south side, ride under the bridge, and go back up on the bridge to Howe, and roll into a shared path that takes you across the freeway. This allows cyclsists to be on the correct side of the road in the most dangerous section of Howe - the hwy 50 interchange.

This plan drops cyclists off on the wrong side of the road. Continuing on to Granite Reigional Park would be difficult. it is not legal to ride a bike in a crosswalk. (but you can push a wheelchair- discussion for another day!) So the option posted requires walking a bike through the crosswalk onto the west side of Howe at Folsom. Then walking the bike across Folsom Blvd to continue riding with traffic on Howe.

There is a freeway level barrier that was erected in 2008 that prevents rolling onto the bridge from the AR parkway on the south side. You can roll on the bridge at university avenue access to the parkway but you cannot roll off. If this path were contiguous, people would have safer access to both Sac State and Folsom blvd. You would then be able to roll off of the bridge and exit the parkway at the Howe ave access point onto La Riviera drive. From there, you can head west to CSUS or East to occidental and get to Folsom Blvd. Both of these options are safer than having to cross over the hwy 50 interchange even if there is a bike path.

How do you envision cyclists accessing the shared path from American River Drive? It appears that cyclists will need to ride against traffic in order to access ths path.

Need seedless connection to river or levee top trails.