After unmarked campus streets were seen as harmful to student safety, Sacramento State spent two years and approximately $37,000 to rename and install 26 street signs.

The origin of the project started when Kirtland Stout, director of Risk Management and Continuity Planning, noticed the street signs in and around Sac State had many oddities, including streets without names, streets with duplicate names and streets that only had unofficial names.

Although Stout said he was unhappy with that discovery, he was willing to put up with the quirky design until an event in 2011 drastically shifted his view.

Walking near Capistrano Hall and Parking Structure I, Stout saw two fire trucks get lost while responding to an emergency on campus because there were no adequate street signs to help label their location.

“We can put up with weird quirky stuff but when it comes to life or death, you ought to have things a little more tightened down,” Stout said.

After researching all the street issues, Stout presented his findings to Vice President and Chief Financial Officer Mike Lee who then green lighted a 12-person committee comprised of representatives from Facilities Services, University Transportation and Parking Services, Public Affairs, Student Affairs and faculty to oversee the project.

Over the next two years, the committee met approximately 10 times to conduct research, designate new street names and ensure compliance with California law, which included approval from the Board of Trustees.

Victor Takahashi, director of Facilities Planning and Construction Services, said the newly labeled streets will also provide easier navigation for students.

“I know it is a big campus and it is intimidating,” Takahashi said. “We are just making small steps to make it easier to get around.”

Kiawna Brewster, a senior English major, said she noticed the new signs during the first week of spring semester and supports the project even though it was more expensive than she expected.

“Obviously money is tight,” Brewster said. “Classes and teachers are getting dropped all the time.”

Takahashi said the process of getting the new streets approved for navigational media programs like Google Maps prolonged the completion of the project. The actual names of the streets were another issue as the committee wanted to base the names around a campus theme.

 “We thought of river themes and academic themes,” Takahashi said. “We decided on tree names because we are the tree campus. It’s kind of what we are known for.”

Stout was unhappy with the tree theme and how small the signs turned out, but was still content with every street being labeled for the first time in Sac State’s history.

“It was high-time to do it,” Stout said. “To have this big of an institution right in the middle of town with a whole bunch of unnamed streets, places you can’t Google Map to and no individual addresses, it is not professional. It is just not acceptable.”