IMAGINE #1 - GOING TO THE FAIR

Visitors to Cal Expo Green do not drive into parking facilities convenient and adjacent to the various exhibit and activity areas as they now do. There is no visitor auto traffic allowed anywhere near those areas nor, indeed, throughout most of the Cal Expo site (except for accessibility provisions for handicapped persons). Instead there are several large parking areas in relatively remote areas of the Cal Expo Grounds. These are placed at locations chosen, not for their proximity and convenience to nearby exhibits and activities, but at locations determined to have the best access from the standpoint of traffic patterns and configurations in surrounding communities and routes that would impose the least impact on them and existing roads and conditions. The sites were also chosen to keep vehicular traffic away from the most densely used pedestrian areas of the facilities and the most congested areas of the surrounding communities. Undoubtedly, there will be a lively debate when it comes time to decide whether inter-city public transport serving Cal Expo, to and from the city and region (whether by bus, light rail or other means), should have the described parking areas or the main exhibit and shopping area as their principal, and/or, only embarkation/disembarkation point. There are good reasons for either or both positions, and it will be interesting to see what result emerges.

The way people get to the exhibit and park areas that extend throughout the remainder of the Cal Expo lands is by intra-Expo (on site) travel - bus, advanced light-rail or low-speed, individualized (2-, 4- , or 6-passenger) electric vehicles which are owned and maintained by Cal Expo itself and rented to visitors. Fees for using these ‘expo-mini’s’ will probably need to be fairly high, just to keep the user volume reasonable. There is no way Cal Expo could afford, use, store or maintain the fifty- or one-hundred thousand vehicles that might be required on a busy day if they were simply free or low cost. By the same token, at least one of the intra-Expo public conveyances should be free (emission free buses or dedicated light-rail) so that there is no cost-barrier to getting around the site for all visitors.

One can also walk to the exhibit and park areas and other venues, similar to the way visitors access the various areas at the Huntington Library and Botanical Gardens in San Moreno. It may even be possible to provide some skateboard and/or bicycle-only pathways throughout the facilities that people (especially younger ones) may wish to bring or rent for their park visits. Incidentally, there are even a few very exciting skateboard parks and some scenic bicycle trails around Cal Expo that can only be accessed by those modes of transport.

In any case, the transportation modes are the most advanced, convenient, safe and comfortable that our technology can provide. The individual electric carts (a little like elegant golf-carts) are, in-fact, programmable, so that the visitor may opt-out of doing the driving and let the cart drive itself, either for point-to-point destinations of the user’s choice or, on various user selected ‘tour’ patterns which may meander through exhibit areas and also present audible information on features as they are encountered. In addition, the carts have a compartment for storing visitor’s personal items as well as small packages they may have purchased during their visit.

Needless to say, all modes of intra-Expo transport conserve energy, leave no emissions or carbon footprints and are, in a direct way, part of the exhibit of California’s prowess in green-transportation. Oh, incidentally, larger visitor purchases from ‘Green Village’ or other venues are distributed to the visitor’s particular parking area by underground conveyance - an electric belt or other advanced handling mode that will deliver the item directly there, where they can claim it when leaving Cal Expo. There is also a general ‘pick-up and ‘will-call’ area on the eastern side of the site, convenient to Expo patrons.

In addition, by the time the parking lots are finished, most cars on California roads will be some version of electric powered or electrically supported vehicle. The parking lots will provide charging stations for visitors that are largely powered by on-site solar facilities, especially during the summer months (see below). Thanks to work at M.I.T. and elsewhere on ‘fast batteries’ as reported on NPR’s ‘Marketplace’ on March 13, 2009, a full charge will take approximately 1 minute, making it possible to charge a fairly significant number of visitor automobiles at a very nominal fee.

IMAGINE #2 - OLD FAIRGROUNDS AND NEW COMMUNITIES

While we’re on the subject of traffic, parking and congestion, it was noted early in the development of the project that these matters were of major concern and would have significant impact on the city in general, with greatest impact on communities immediately adjacent to the Expo site itself. Traffic problems were serious before the project started, and Old Expo had already started spilling over into parking lots and congested areas east of Exposition Blvd. long before the project started. During the first twenty-five years that Cal Expo transformed itself into a world-class venue and destination for travelers, visitor census increased dramatically. Visitors from out-of-state increased the most, but had the least impact owing to the fact that the majority of those patrons used public conveyance during their stay in Sacramento. The fair became so popular as a destination that a consortium of local hotels ran regular free shuttles to the fair. Some of the large hotels maintained their own dedicated shuttle services. Statewide visitors, however, made significant impacts that had to be dealt with. Californians do love their cars. Of course, there was a regular shuttle between ‘K’ Street Mall and the fair.

Problems for the Aden-Arcade and Arden-Fair areas were particularly severe and difficult to solve. The outlying parking provisions, mentioned in the last section, took care of most of the problems of traffic coming from the south and west regions. But a good amount of northern and eastern traffic still took advantage of pedestrian access to the main exhibit-hall and performance/fairgrounds, ‘Green Village’ and the like, which remained clustered at the eastern side and south-eastern sides of the site. Their inclination to ‘short-cut’ on-site parking (and avoid parking fees and intra-Expo conveyance fees) resulted in some congestion in the adjacent neighborhoods, often filling merchant lots and residential street parking, as it had before the re-envisioned Cal Expo was built. Everyone, city planners, Expo management and neighbors in the surrounding communities have come to accept it as a fact of life and a trade-off for the numerous benefits of having Cal Expo located in their locale. To some degree, the character of those areas immediately adjacent the fairground site has changed over the years to accommodate the presence of a world-class attraction in their midst. Advantaging themselves of the opportunities presented have far outweighed the impacts and inconveniences.

One of the more interesting trade-offs, earlier on, was the agreement for the Expo developers and the city to induce a couple of types of business that had been sorely lacking in those areas for many decades. The first was having a major retail grocery store conveniently located at that end of the district (the closest formerly being Safeway near Watt and Arden Way, Trader Joe’s at El Camino and Safeway at Fair Oaks and Howe) Now, thanks to the increased customer base that Cal Expo brings with it, there is a new Trader Joe’s near Hurley Way,and a large natural foods store - ‘a natural’ - collaborative effort between The Sacramento Natural Foods Coop and Eliotts Natural Foods - located very near the main fairgrounds themselves. Add to that, "Good Eats" grocery that anchors the north end, just north of the Business 80 freeway, and the surrounding neighborhoods are no longer complaining about the lack of convenient near-by grocery shopping. Incidentally, the ‘Good Eats’ deal was an interesting reward, through the city’s offer of some tax-incentives, for Michael Teel’s generosity and business ethic, in backing off displacing Corti Bros. from its traditional location a decade earlier. That little bit of good moral sense earned ‘Good Eats’ some attractive inducements to build the new store, and the residents were overwhelmingly glad their city council showed such a long memory and heartfelt appreciation about the matter.

Oh, lest we forget, the on-site Farmer’s Market (now the largest in the region) is open every weekend during the summer and fall. The constant flow of people moving between there and the main fair venues unmistakably told us that, that location is perfect for Cal Expo and good for Farmer’s Market shoppers alike.

The neighboring communities have derived many other benefits as the character of their business and residential areas are impacted. Some are the result of natural associations and opportunities the new Cal Expo themes of advanced environmental, resource and other technologies have brought with their development. Hardware stores, such as Emigh’s and Ace, have begun to stock their shelves with tools and hardware items that support newer technologies and products (fittings and low-voltage add-ons for solar systems, drip-irrigation supplies, home water-saving and filtration items, etc.) Green Village merchants are also doing a lively business, primarily centered around the newest, larger devices and whole systems products such as solar panels, composting toilets and gray water managment, emission-free fire places, those sorts of items in addition to office space for services such as architectural, legal and health service professionals concentrating on clean energy, resource friendly, advanced technology designs and offerings.

The basic philosophy of the Green Village management staff has been to generally exclude offerings that are already well-known and widely distributed and can best be handled by local merchants. It is the Cal Expo aim to showcase and promote the newest and best, rather than to compete for sales with California businesses. A natural partnership has developed that is well in keeping with the over all mission of a revitalized Exposition.

And, there is one more unique feature regarding Cal Expo’s relationship to its neighbors. The site maintains a permanent Community Assistance Office and Center. There, residents and businesses in the nearby neighborhoods find expert planners ready to assist them with their concerns, help with needs to mitigate unforeseen impacts and develop programs that serve both the interest of the neighbors as well as Cal Expo. There are already annual science art and poetry fairs held on the fairgrounds and run through the auspices of Cal Expo. Jointly organized by Cal Expo and the public school districts, the science fair has already sent several children who have exhibited there on to become national contest winners, further enhancing the prestige of the work at Cal Expo.

At a table, to one side of the Center’s main reception room, I notice a planner assisting a neighborhood resident with her concerns about some unsavory characters who congregate near her home after Fair closing time. Let’s eavesdrop on them for a moment. Interestingly, the planner isn’t merely referring her to some other agency such as the police or telling her to write her council representative. Instead, they are working together to translate her concerns into a form that will be most likely to get the attention and resolution it requires from the agencies most related to her problem. Nor will he simply send her off with the copy and a list of phone numbers and addresses. Instead, the planner will send the materials, by email, to the agencies and individuals who can best respond to those particular community concerns, along with his own notes on the matter. The neighbor, herself, can then go on-line to track the progress of things, perhaps returning to the Center at a later time to further refine or amend her original needs.

We observe that the planner doesn’t end the session when they finish work on the initial problem. He makes other inquiries - Has she noticed any increase in mosquitoes the past week or so? How does she like the new low-light-pollution street lights that have been installed on her block? Has she seen the new exhibit on car-pooling that the fair installed over at the ‘Transport of the Future’ area? We get the idea that this isn’t just another government service counter. The planner is actively engaging the client in a discussion about the neighborhood and its various concerns and opinions. This not only adds to the Center’s overall user friendliness, but gives the planner insight and valuable heads-up information about other problems and directions that may be coming in the future.

In another corner of the Center, a planner is going over next year’s exhibit and events calendar with a local neighborhood merchant to see how he might be able to take advantage of particular events and exhibits to improve his business potentials. More partnering with neighborhood citizens to help Cal Expo and the surrounding communities work together.

One benefit of Cal Expo’s new organization and the presence of its community affairs office, is that the neighborhood associations and other community organizations have become, over time, reinvigorated and more engaged, both in the activities at Cal Expo, and in the needs of their own communities. From the very start of the project, Cal Expo discovered that proactively informing the community of its plans and involving them in the processes of

envisioning a very new Cal Expo not only greatly reduced the misunderstandings and contentiousness that often accompanies large project development, but actually resulted in inclusions of ideas and provisions that the designers of Cal Expo hadn’t even thought about. This, to the benefit of both Cal Expo and its surrounding communities. A win-win situation, all around.