Manteca four years ago was told by the Union Pacific Railroad to expect train traffic to eventually triple to 60 trains a day on the Fresno line that passes through the middle of the city.

On Tuesday, the City Council adopted a $238,000 plan designed to create a “safer, more accessible and more inviting downtown and east Manteca.”

That plan, paid for with a Caltrans grant the city accepted in December 2020, proposes having a high density urban village within a stone’s throw of tracks that carry freight ranging from intermodal trailers on flatbeds to oil and chemical tankers through Manteca at 55 mph.

And due to the level of train traffic already passing through the city, there are often diesel train engines idling  on a siding next to where consultants have advocated placing  high density housing as well as a park.

The possible mixed use is on the largest parcel of undeveloped land in the central district. It is a triangle of agricultural land that typically is used to produce hay.

The parcel is bounded by the Manteca Industrial Park, Industrial Park Drive and the railroad tracks that is currently an unincorporated island surrounded by the City of Manteca.

Staff, responding to council questions, said by adopting the plan elected leaders weren’t necessarily buying into what was presented as something that would actually happen.

Instead, the staff could use bits and pieces to make existing streets safer and more inviting. The fact a plan exists would allow the city to take one or more components aimed at enhancing intersectionsw and streets to improve safer and accessibility to seek grants to do such work.

As for the land use suggestion, the property in question would need to be annexed to the city.

In the past — due to it being located on the only truck route the city has designated that also connects the Spreckels and Manteca industrial parks to Highway 99 and the 120 Bypass — city discussions have centered around the land in question one day being developed as a business park.

It is also on land that the city’s stormwater system plans at one time called for a large basin that would serve the area yet to be developed as well as replace a smaller basin built on Moffat Boulevard as a “temporary” retention basin 15 years ago.

The consultant envisions a small employment center on part of the land in  question  as well as a commercial area aimed at small businesses,.

There may be drawbacks to the plan including the fact the current owner made it clear when he fought the extension of Industrial Park Drive to Moffat Boulevard that sliced through his land that he doesn’t want to annex to the city. His heirs may also want to continue farming the land,

That said, the plan as presented adds another dimension to future considerations for downtown or the central district.

The Caltrans grant was predicated on making non-automobile forms of movement more appealing.  And it was capitalizing particularly on the fact the city within a year’s time will have an ACE train stop in the heart of the central district that initially will connect commuters to employment center as far north of Natomas north of downtown Sacramento and San Jose.

And once the Valley Link system from the Dublin-Pleasanton BART station to the Lathrop Wye is up and running  sometime after 2028, you could board trains in downtown Manteca to work as far away as San Francisco by making several rail transfers.

Given the parcel is within a half mile of the passenger train platform that will be built it may end up making sense from a transit village standpoint as well as providing alternative transportation for those with household incomes below the median to access employment without relying on cars to do so.

While the part of the plan zeroing in on the triangle parcel along Industrial Park Drive may be a long-range option, simply pie-in-the-sky, or impractical, there were components that council members were drawn to.

Councilman Dave Breitenbucher liked the suggested improvements to the Powers Avenue and Yosemite Avenue intersection.

The plan calls for widening the sidewalks and forcing traffic into narrower lanes to slow vehicles down as well as striping to make sure two lanes don’t head west when only one is supposed to do so.

Similar improvements on Powers Avenue at Hutchings Street —  a major pedestrian crossing for school children and those accessing Lincoln Park — as well at Marin Street had sidewalks “bulbed out” on the corners of the intersections widened to enhance pedestrian safety and slow traffic.

It is similar to what the city has placed on streets bordering neighborhood parks in newer developments south of the 120 Bypass to enhance pedestrian safety and slow traffic.

The city could readily take those three components from the plan and use it to seek state funding. It could even come from the safe routes to schools program given Powers Avenue is heavily traveled with students going to and from Lincoln school as well as Manteca High.

Even a proposal to have Manteca Avenue T-intersect with Yosemite Avenue by Library Park and remake the existing plaza instead of doing so at the current angle conceivably could move forward.

It would dovetail to a degree into Mayor Gary Singh’s vision to create a bypass of downtown for through traffic to use an extension of Moffat west of Main Street to connect with Yosemite Avenue where it currently intersects with Manteca Avenue.

Singh’s vision would then allow improvements on Yosemite Avenue in downtown that could include wider sidewalks for al fresco dining and such.

Toi contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com