For previous posts on the proposed Truxel Bridge, see category Truxel Bridge.

The Truxel Bridge Concept and Feasibility Study is on the Sacramento City Council agenda for Tuesday, February 18, 2025, at the 5:00 PM session. It is the only agenda item for that session.

The recommendations in the staff report are that council accept the study, designate alternative alignment 3B as preferred, and direct the city manager to implement the project. Staff is not recommending that council consider the rejection by Sacramento Active Transportation Commission of all four alternatives. However, council can take any action it chooses on the agenda item, without restriction to the staff recommendations. It is hoped that council will follow the recommendation of SacATC to reject all four alternatives in the study, rescind the 2013 city adoption of Truxel Bridge with private motor vehicles, and re-start the process with alternatives including no bridge, a bridge withouty motor vehicles, and a different location for the bridge (perhaps using the Hwy 160 river crossing).

The text relevant to SacATC in the staff report (page 7) is below:

“The four alternatives were brought back to the Active Transportation Commission on January 16, 2025, to identify a preferred alternative to recommend to Council. Instead, the ATC rejected all of the alternatives with a recommendation for Council to direct staff to analyze an alternative without cars.

Please note that accepting the ATC recommendations would require amendments to the City’s General Plan Mobility Element and the SACOG Regional Transportation Plan to designate the bridge as a transit-only bridge with bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure. RT would become the lead agency, as the City of Sacramento is not a designated transit agency and is therefore ineligible to directly apply for federal or state transit capital funding or to consult directly with state and federal transit oversight and funding agencies, even with active transportation components. The City would act as a responsible and commenting agency when RT is ready to advance the project toward construction and would continue to collaborate with RT in pursuing funding opportunities.”

You may speak on the agenda item in person at the city council meeting by filling out a speaker card (since this is the only agenda item, make sure you do that right away), and by submitting an eComment on the eComment page. You may do both.

The Draft Final Truxel Bridge Concept & Feasibility Study is available in part 1 and part 2. These are large documents, somewhat downsampled. If you need full resolution, you can download from the city website. If you have been following the Truxel Bridge issue, you probably don’t need to review this document, as it is largely the same as earlier drafts.

It is worth noting that if this project moves forward, a federal Environmental Impact Report and state CEQA Environmental Impact Report would likely be required, and would likely require an alternative with no action (no bridge) and no private motor vehicles. It would be best to include these alternatives from the beginning, not go back later and add them.

• Truxel Bridge