Nashville Metro planners looking to encourage TNDs

Nashville Metro planners are looking at ways to make it easier to build traditional neighborhoods, according to a Nashvillecitypaper.com report. It takes six months longer for a typical new urban development to be approved, compared to a conventional suburban project, according to the article. That is the case even though the Nashville area, with planning director Richard Bernhardt, is more attuned to New Urbanism than most regions. The planners use the Transect — with its six zones based on degree of urbanism — as a basis for exploring new codes. Currently, Nashville Metro has 45-50 zoning districts, few of which are conducive to mixed use, the article states. Nashville already has a couple of examples of New Urbanism underway, the Gulch, an infill/brownfield project, and Lennox Village, a greenfield neighborhood. “It was expensive because we had to develop a code,” says David McGowan, developer of Lennox Village.