Uneasy Rhetoric

One thing I really hate about blogging: you’re expected to take a stand on whatever issue you’re addressing. You aren’t allowed to be a fence-sitter, a centrist, an “undecided” - in short, you aren’t allowed to be half-assed about anything.

This has really hit home on my recent post, “Manhattan, the Pearl, and Penis Envy,” not only via the comments on the post, but via more extensive comments on the Skyscraperpage Forums (a good discussion, by the way).

I’ve been labeled as anti-tower, and it just isn’t true. For one thing, I’ve always been a big believer that growing up is better than growing out. Sprawl is not good.

My concerns with (not oppositions to - there is a difference) the towers are:

Can the Sacramento market sustain so many luxury condos? I just don’t know. Obviously the developers think so.

What is up with the obsession over “luxury” living in downtown Sacramento? I’m concerned that the city and developers need to consider housing that attracts a diversity of family types and a diversity of incomes. I don’t think the towers fill the bill by themselves.

Will the towers help create community or will they be largely isolated, making them function like vertical gated communities? So much depends on the tower-dwellers willingness to be a part of downtown. Of course they’ll go outside — gated communities aren’t prisons — but will they shop downtown or go out to the malls? Will their children attend public schools? Will they walk in downtown after dark? Will they identify themselves as “living downtown”? Will they move out when they discover that the homeless problem hasn’t disappeared? I can’t say. If they towers get built, I hope they will help develop a community of committed downtown dwellers.

Ultimately, Sacramento’s status as a “first class city” will not rest on the size of its buildings. What matters is creating a situation that maximizes the number of people who think living in the city is a good thing, and by “living” I mean a lot more than just “going to sleep in a house in the city.” Even more important, the situation will maximize the number of people who can afford to live in the city.

And here I’m going to say something very positive about the tower proposals: housing is the key to revitalizing Downtown Sacramento - no amount of retail or office development or sports arena will do it without that key.

A few final thoughts:

1) My use of the phrase “cowtown” was unfortunate. Sacramento used to wear that label with a perverse sort of pride, until Phil Jackson used it during the playoffs a few years ago. I would love for Sac. to lose that moniker, believe me, but it’s going to take more than a bunch of luxury condos downtown to do it.

2) Don’t get in a pissing match with me over my civic pride or the amount of time I do or don’t spend downtown. I have a big bladder.

3) I don’t care who designed it, the Aura is not an attractive building. However, it does have balconies (at least they look like balconies), which I think is a good thing.