New urbanism -- right for Yolo County > Rexroad.com

Surf Putah (SP) has a new post today that I actually agree with. Amazing. You can read it here.
SP is exactly right. This is the same principle that we need to follow as we improve the Woodland downtown core.

This means --

1) Getting the car dealer out of the downtown. These are the sorts of things that can be located on the edge of town since they are nto good that are consumed on a regular basis by each consumer.

2) New housing has to be at the core of the downtown redevelopment. We need to get people into downtown Woodland. This means that second story residences in the office and retail space downtown. We also need to get the area along the railroad tracks to be housing that will bring people into the downtown core. We need people. Throw a baseball down Main Street in Woodland at 10pm on a Wednesday night. You won't hit anyone. Try that same thing in a well designed redeveloped dowtown area.

3) Keep the courthouse in downtown Woodland. A big part of the Woodland downtown area is associated with government services. Title companies, law offices, and associated government offices are located near the court house. Woodland simply has to have the Yolo County Courthouse in the downtown area.

New urbanism is the path for downtown Woodland. I believe that is one of the many reasons why we need to do the things above.

Comments

By Bobby Harris @ Saturday, April 14, 2007 4:31 PM

I’m surprised that this entry in Matt’s blog doesn’t (yet) have any comments.

Urbanizing Woodland is perhaps this community’s most important existing planning challenge / opportunity. Why it hasn’t happened faster is a good question, but from Matt’s attention, understanding and leadership, I’ll expect that somehow more progress will soon be made.

The concept of “urban renaissance,” actually based upon the original format of concentrated development - like the small town with a central square, surrounded by multi-story developmement, . . . and not much sprawl.

It’s simply the well known model of the Old West town (or Old East town, for that matter).

This classic model of community was forever altered by the automobile, which permitted persons to conveniently live and work at great distances between. That’s sometimes a good idea, but not always, not to the extent that surburban sprawl has adversely (for us and the planet) influenced culture. Good marketing and bad political leadership (plus economic corruption) has led to the environmentally unsustainable spot we find ourselves, in Woodland and most other communities.

Housing must now re-proliferate in the downtown area, in order to effectively return to the more environmentally suitable model of community, As Matt mentions. Housing is (perhaps alongside health care) the largest crisis facing California and Woodland. Housing must be created within Woodland’s downtown area, in order to avoid further development of farmland.

It’s that obvious and simple.

When I was a boardmember of the Downtowners and twice a candidate for city council, about 20 years ago, this was a big issue (and there was some level of downtown renaissance) but it’s a much bigger issue . . . now, since people cannot afford housing and the petroleum ecomony has become a basic problem.

Matt’s also right on target that the car dealer needs to be provided suitable incentives to relocate to the outskirts. Incentives from the city don’t need to be massive, just accomplish the job of persuading the car dealer that he’s not going to lose money over the basic move. This dealer will likely increase his sales, just from the news of the move and community gratitude. Everybody wins, that’s the way it needs to work.

Is there talk of moving the courthouse? Is that even possible? Is there some talk of another courthouse needing to be built?

Matt, say it itsn’t true. This is a hugely bad idea. Makes me wonder what’s behind such a strange notion.

Admittedly, the courthouse is antiquated and additional facilities elsewhere in downtown may be need, to some limited extent, in order to properly function (doensn’t the Odd Fellows Building still function as such an overflow?), but the notion of relocating court functions to some peripheral location is a bad one.

An entire culture of related business and services surround the courthouse, and they are a significant and essential element in Woodland’s downtown identity.

And the courthouse is one of the nicest places in the city, from an architectural and aesthetic standpoint.

Matt’s a good political leader for attempting to draw attention to this key subject, and by crediting another (somewhat liberal) source for his inspiration to create a blog entry. The fact is that these concepts of community re-development have been slowly progressing for several decades. It’s not really new as an idea, just new to actually get it done.

Woodland has much more potential than Davis, to accomplish this goal, and now needs to act on that potential.

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