A vision for State Street emerged a bit clearer on Monday at Santa Barbara’s Faulkner Gallery.

A band of local architects presented sketches of three blocks, along with the creation of several paseos, during the State Street Advisory Committee meeting.

The renderings were designed to show what State Street could look like.

“It needs to feel like Santa Barbara,” architect Anthony Grumbine said. “That was our big push and what we were going for.”

The group showed color sketches for the 400, 800 and 1100 blocks. The drawings were not specific, and did not articulate whether vehicles, bikes or pedestrians would be allowed on the streets. Grumbine said the sketches were not a specific design but a “design strategy” and “toolkit” for moving forward.

The architects showed a fountain, trees, wide sidewalks, tents for a market, landscaping, art sculptures and other features designed to illustrate the area.

“This is incredible,” committee member and Santa Barbara City Councilwoman Kristen Sneddon said. “This is it. This is a home run. This is, to me, what I have been waiting for to see.”

She said the idea of a State Street Master Plan in the first place came from the architects and the AIA charettes they had several years ago.

Committee member Nadra Ehrman said the latest sketches and conversation show the city is “on the right track.” She said she appreciated the architects “bringing the poetry back to this conversation.”

“The vision that we were able to have in this meeting, it crystalized in a way that we haven’t seen,” Ehrman said.

Robin Elander, executive director of the Downtown Organization, said she was impressed with what the architects shared, and added that the process was headed in the right direction.

“Today, I was very thankful to see really how the street treatments, the sense of arrival, the placemaking, the tree scale, the meaningful, thoughtful sense of discovery can create a vibrate economic space,” Elander said.

The architects came together after Dave Davis, chair of the State Street Advisory Committee, asked Grumbine to pull a team together to work on drawings to create a “wow factor” for State Street.

The City Council in 2022 approved a $780,000 contract with MIG to oversee the State Street Master Plan process. MIG’s previous renderings were not popular with the public.

Tess Harris, the city’s State Street master planner, said the city still has an active contract with MIG and that she meets with the company weekly. So far, the city has paid $378,000, not quite half of the contract.

Although most everyone agreed that the sketches were moving in the right direction, others raised questions about the practicality of paying for such a major redesign of State Street.

“There are still some really big questions about State Street,” councilwoman and committee member Meagan Harmon said. “Are we going to have cars? Are we not going to have cars? What blocks are going to be involved in this plan? Are there going to be bikes or no bikes?”

Harmon said she understands that the sketches are just a framework, but she doesn’t understand how the city can accept a framework that is predicated on several unresolved questions. She said the committee should take votes on the various aspects because there’s no way the City Council is going to approve a master plan without some clarity and consensus from the committee.

“That continues to be my concern,” Harmon said. “I really believe that it is in this committee’s best interest that we take a vote on these questions so we can move forward in a way that has some clarity.”

Committee member Ed Lenvik also raised some concerns that the master plan talks have not made their way to the Historic Landmarks Commission. It was a concern also echoed by Hillary Blackerby, who wanted the issue to go to the Transportation & Circulation Committee, of which she’s a member.

City staff expect the public to review the draft plan from August to October, before final review by the Advisory Committee in December. The City Council is expected to vote on the final master plan by early 2025.

Susanne Tejada, a member of the community, said the discussion was a step backward.

“Further development needs to be studied of the street itself and the plans and what we are actually looking at in terms of what we are looking at,” Tejada said. “Is this going to have pedestrians? Is this going to have bikes? Is this going to have cars? Is this going to have a trolley or a tram? We still don’t know.”

Committee member and Councilman Mike Jordan urged everyone to be patient and to understand that the State Street Master Plan is a process and people can’t wait for everything to be perfect before moving forward.

“One hundred years ago, the city didn’t just automatically become Santa Barbara,” Jordan said. “It took decades to do it. People need to know this is going to be a multi-decade project, and there are going to be some really tough choices to make in terms of priorities and dollar decisions. It’s certainly not going to get easier.”

He said there are going to be wins, losses and arguments.

“To do nothing is to do something, and we really need to move on doing something,” Jordan said, quoting former California Gov. Jerry Brown.