One-Way Street, Narrower Roads in Store for The Village

Sacramento County Supervisor Susan Peters organized a community meeting Thursday night to give an update on the Fair Oaks Village Streetscape Project.

The meeting featured a panel that included the Fair Oaks Village Enhancement Committee (FOVEC), Department of Transportation and the Fair Oaks Recreation and Park District.

The project is funded by a $513,000 grant from the Sacramento Area Council of Governments (SACOG) and will make the area more ADA compliant, widen some sidewalks, narrow the road, add crosswalks and a one-way street. The goal is to make The Village more pedestrian-friendly.

Greg Vincent, FOVEC chair, said the changes to The Village would add some immediate benefit to the community.

“Now this project doesn’t answer all of the concerns and do everything that we’re looking for in the vision, of course it can’t, but it’s a good start and FOVEC plans to continue our work to look for public funds for other projects,” Vincent said.

Maureen Zamarripa, district administrator for the Fair Oaks Recreation and Park District, presented plans for the park in The Village. Zamarripa said the park will still look and feel the same.

The plan is for the restrooms to be remodeled and the playground and band stage to remain the same. A walking path will also be added to the park area and improved ADA access will be added to the Clubhouse.

“This is not going to be a small endeavor,” Zamarripa said. “It was purposely divided into zones so we could approach the implementation of it in stages.”

Mike Penrose and Scott Werth, engineers from the Department of Transportation, provided a diagram that showed the changes that will occur throughout The Village.

One of the main changes will occur in the triangle area where Fair Oaks meets Winding Way. A one-way street will be added along with two additional parking spots. A pedestrian walkway, decorative street light and widened curbs, gutter and sidewalk for ADA compliance will also be added to that area.

Some community members asked why the triangle could not be replaced with a roundabout, but Werth said that would be too costly for this project, which has a budget of $513,000.

In addition to the triangle area, parts of Fair Oaks Boulevard will be narrower to help control traffic speeds. Werth said the width of the road will still be safe, but the goal is to slowdown traffic and help discourage drivers from cutting through the area.

Werth said the changes took about a year to design. He said one big challenge during the design process was the ADA compliant modifications because the area is sloped.

“Our goal is to limit out cut-through traffic to The Village and this should accomplish that,” Werth said. “[The community response] has been very favorable, which is very exciting for us.”

The Fair Oaks Chamber of Commerce Executive Director, Jan Bass Otto, said she is happy with the changes that will be coming.

“I thought it was a great presentation and it looks like a great plan,” Bass Otto said. “I personally like the one-way street. That’s a dangerous corner, so I’m glad they’re taking care of that.”

Fair Oaks resident Eric Kiesow was also happy about the one-way street.

“I was especially enthusiastic about the changes to come with the one-way road,” Kiesow said. “I come through on a bike often and that would make it a much more doable corner.”

One concern that came up at the meeting was Fair Oaks’ annual Chicken Festival in August, which may overlap with the project’s construction. The Department of Transportation engineers said they would try to find a way to work around the event.

The Board of Supervisors will vote next week to approve to project. Peters said the voting is a formality so that the project can be bid out, but that the funding is already there and the board has already agreed to approve it.

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For more information on the project be sure to check out the other stories in the .