Inside the congestion-busting freeway and bridge system that Sacramento refused to build

Rancho Cordova resident Dave Wilkerson asked a simple question last week after reading our story about Sacramento County’s proposed transportation sales tax measure for the November ballot.

“Your Measure A article mentioned a lot of ‘fixes’ but missed something big. From Highway 50 to cross over the American River there is a large area that’s missed. The area between Watt Avenue and Sunrise Boulevard needs a bridge.”

OK, technically that’s not a question. It’s a desire, one expressed frequently over the years by beleaguered east county drivers who find themselves awaiting endless red lights in long lines of cars on Watt, Sunrise and Fair Oaks Boulevard.

But I’m going to blow the whistle right here, so that there’s no confusion: There will be no bridge built over the American River between Watt and Sunrise. The time for that came and went 45 years ago.

Back in the 1960s, when California was leading the nation in freeway construction, there were plans for two freeways that would have cut through suburban Sacramento and crossed the American River linking Interstate 80 to Highway 50.

You can still see the starting point for those two freeways. It’s the Auburn Boulevard exit off I-80, a little ways northeast of the Watt Avenue exit. You notice that the exit is so big it momentarily feels like you’re on another freeway. But it just dead ends immediately at Auburn Boulevard.

It’s like an archaeological remnant, our own mysterious Stonehenge.

One of those two freeways would have cut across town through Carmichael and Fair Oaks along the Winding Way corridor and connected to the not-yet-built Highway 50 freeway where Gold River is today.

The other freeway would have branched off and headed south, following the Eastern Avenue alignment, crossing the river at about the west edge of Rio Americano High School and linking with Highway 50 at Mayhew Road, a little west of Bradshaw Road.

But in the mid-1970s, the county and state backed off. California had done a lot of freeway construction, with more on the way, but was losing its zest, given the costs, disruption and growing opposition.

At the time, the state had just finished building Highway 50 through East Sacramento, destroying a swath of that neighborhood. Residents in Carmichael did not want to find themselves next in the bulldozers’ way. Environmentalists too were suggesting a rethink of suburban sprawl fed by freeways.

Wayne Lewis, a longtime Caltrans project manager and an advisor for Measure A, and Rancho Cordova Mayor David Sander say they wish the state and county had gone ahead with another crossing between Sunrise and Watt.

But both say it seems impractical to try now.

The county and state would have to play bully by using eminent domain law to clear a path for a major road leading to and over the river. Moreover, more Sacramento leaders have a desire to protect the American River Parkway and its wildlife habitat from concrete and cars.

With that in mind, the county transportation chief came up with a thought 15 years ago: How about building a tunnel under the American River and under Eastern Avenue, connecting the two freeways? That billion-dollar idea went nowhere quickly.

The result of that and continued suburban growth have left Sunrise Boulevard and Watt Avenue oversubscribed, and left reader Wilkerson dealing with traffic jams the moment he leaves his cul-de-sac near Coloma Road and Sunrise Boulevard.

“Lots of times we can’t even turn left onto Coloma,” he said. To head downtown, he will wind through the neighborhood and get on Highway 50 at Zinfandel.

A few miles west, however, the cities of Sacramento and West Sacramento haven’t given up on bridges. Here is a look at the four bridge possibilities, two over the American River and two over the Sacramento River. All of them are at least several years away from being built, and will only be built if the region comes up with money it doesn’t currently have:

Capital City Freeway

The stretch between midtown and Arden Fair is considered the worst freeway bottleneck in the region. State and local officials want to widen or replace the existing twin bridges over the American River.

It will take years to cobble together funding. Measure A funds would be used as leverage to score federal and state grants, including competitive grants from the SB 1 gas tax of 2017.

This bridge, like any bridge over the parkway, will be fought and possibility litigated by parkway advocates.

South Natomas light rail

The city of Sacramento and Sacramento Regional Transit are doing early planning for a local commuter bridge over the American River that would connect South Natomas at Truxel Road with the River District (Richards Boulevard) north of the downtown Railyards.

SacRT would use it to run light rail for commuters from Natomas communities to downtown jobs. The transit agency hopes at some piont to extend that line to Sacramento International Airport.

Sacramento city officials want to allow cars on the bridge. Caltrans is supportive because it will take some local commute traffic off congested Interstate 5 over the American River.

Environmentalists and parkway advocates oppose the new bridge, and have said light rail should be attached to the existing I-5 bridge instead.

I Street Replacement Bridge

Sacramento and West Sacramento are teaming to finance a bridge that would run from C Street in West Sacramento to Railyards Boulevard in Sacramento’s soon-to-develop downtown Railyards, future home to a Kaiser Permanente medical center, a Major League Soccer stadium, as well as other development.

This bridge would span the Sacramento River and remove cars from the upper deck of the existing I Street Bridge, which would continue to serve as a train bridge. There are plans to make the upper deck a pedestrian area. The city would take down the upper-level car ramps, opening up part of the riverfront there for development.

The two cities have come up with most of the money needed, but not all. They’ve hired an architect who will unveil bridge designs on Friday.

Broadway Bridge

Of the four, this one appears to be the farthest off. If built, it will give West Sacramento residents, especially in Southport, another route to downtown Sacramento jobs, allowing them to avoid traffic on the Pioneer Memorial Bridge which carries Highway 50 over the Sacramento River. This bridge is in conceptual planning stages and does not have funding.

This story was originally published February 19, 2020 at 5:00 AM.