To those of us who want to contain suburban sprawl, Portland, Oregon, has been a model. Now there's another city to watch: Sacramento, California.

This morning's Wall Street Journal reports on Sacramento's increasingly successful effort to encourage denser development and contain sprawl. Even developers have bought into the six-county Sacramento movement. One result, says the Journal: construction of apartments, condominiums, and town houses in developed areas has increased dramatically, and the development of large-lot subdivisions has dropped.

There are numerous differences between Sacramento and Greater Rochester. And California's state government seems more interested in controlling sprawl than New York's does. The California transportation department is giving grants to help communities create anti-sprawl plans.

Still, it's worth keeping an eye on the Sacramento experience. Greater Rochester has plenty of reasons to control sprawl: since our population isn't growing, new housing development creates vacancies in housing elsewhere. And the new development is chewing up valuable open space, affecting our quality of life.

On we go, though. Brighton is considering proposals for major housing development on vacant land along the Erie Canal - including a gated community. And hardly anybody's speaking up.