I was a little sad but I am over it.

Sacramento is not a grown-up city yet. It is still gangly and awkward and it worries a lot about how people see it. City planning comes up real often around here because the city is changing so conspicuously. The place is still small enough that everyone knows the influential planners, architects, policy-makers around town. Everyone has opinions about what they want Sacramento to look like.

Midtown could talk about nothing else when the new Safeway opened. It wasn’t the Safeway so much, but the chrome horse! Did you see the chrome horse? That was a silly question, because who could miss the giant, huge, shiny chrome horse? Took two weeks for us to talk about anything else. (Now, I am only an engineer. I don’t understand these fancy underlying meanings and multiple artistic interpretations. Perhaps if I had an advanced degree in art, I would know why the developer chose to erect a massive prancing stallion and a thrusting faux-water tower at the new Safeway.)

So people feel real involved in Sacramento’s development and public art. Most everyone immediately hated the Tsakapoulos’ proposed new skyscraper. Most people felt that we didn’t need a thirty story building topped by a full-scale replica of the Parthenon. Here's the artist's rendering for you.

I couldn’t believe the proposal, but right after I decided it wasn’t a joke, I kinda loved it. I would love to take people downtown and watch them realize that someone put a replica of the Parthenon on top of a local skyscraper. There was some small chance that it would have public access and we need more rooftop access around here. And why not have it look like the Parthenon? I was all for it.

The Tsakapoulos family announced today that they have changed plans in favor of a sleek new building with no Greek monuments on it. I suppose it was inevitable.