Local laws change to accommodate human-scale neighborhoods

While the New Urbanism is still strongly discouraged by most subdivision and zoning ordinances, an increasing number of local jurisdictions are approving laws that allow mixed-use, pedestrian-oriented developments. New Urban News and the Congress for the New Urbanism compiled a selected list of 39 municipal and county ordinances nationwide that promote the New Urbanism (see table beginning on page 5). Most have been adopted since 1995 (some are pending approval). They do not represent a complete list of such ordinances nationwide, but offer some of the best examples from each category. Key features of each ordinance are listed. The full sprectrum of new urbanist work is represented in these ordinances. Ten of the laws, categorized as “infill,” are aimed mostly at developing small parcels within existing municipalities. Six focus on creating villages and towns surrounded by open space in semirural settings. Five exclusively target development surrounding transit stops. Many of the ordinances categorized as “TND” spring from Duany Plater-Zyberk’s (DPZ’s) 1991 Dade County ordinance and subsequent work. A few of the TND ordinances specifically apply to one project. Finally, “New Urbanism general” is a broad category consisting mostly of municipality-wide laws that use a range of strategies to promote interconnected neighborhoods on both greenfield and infill sites. What these ordinances all have in common is that they recognize the importance of design in creating walkable, human-scale communities. Common elements include allowing or requiring a mixture of uses and housing types, interconnected street patterns, buildings that face public space, small setbacks (or build-to lines), parking on interior of lots, alleys (and set-back garages), and accessory apartments. Some call for architecture that follows historic precedent. Appropriate street, lot, and block dimensions, and descriptions of building types are included in some laws. Driving forces As planners and public officials become aware of the New Urbanism, some become converts. They push through laws “to make it easier for this type of development to occur in their communities,” says Daniel Slone, who has written new urbanist codes and is an attorney with McGuire, Woods, Battle & Boothe in Richmond, Virginia. In historic areas, the motivation may be to ensure new development is in accord with traditional neighborhoods. In fast-growing semirural areas, public officials are channeling growth into villages to preserve open space and “rural character.” In some areas, most notably Oregon, new urbanist ordinances are a tool to support transit. Oregon is a hotbed of this type of planning right now. The Portland area’s “2040 Plan,” and the 1991 State Transportation Rule encourage high-density, mixed-use villages around transit stops, says John Fregonese, a planner with Fregonese Calthorpe Associates. Fregonese was Portland Metro’s planning director when the 2040 Plan was drafted and adopted. A recently completed light rail line connecting Portland to its western suburbs spurred a series of transit- oriented development ordinances, Fregonese says. Significant new development recently has been built along that line, including both well-designed New Urbanism and hybrid projects than contain many pedestrian-oriented characteristics. “The pedestrian-oriented design ap-proach is becoming more and more common around Portland,” he says. “I wouldn’t say 100 percent of the development is good, but probably 50 percent at this point.” Oregon’s urban growth boundaries (UGBs), put in place in the early 1970s, did not create compact, pedestrian-oriented neighborhoods. Only when the UGBs began to fill up was the pattern of development forced to change. “Everyone is waking up to the idea that design is a critical component of adding density,” says Bill Lennertz of Lennertz & Coyle, a Portland design firm specializing in New Urbanism. Lennertz adds, “everyone agrees that this kind of development is desirable around station areas, because of the public investment that goes into building transit.” Florida is another state with a lot of new urbanist ordinances. Compared to Oregon’s laws, Florida’s are more general in scope, allowing or promoting TND throughout metropolitan regions. Jacksonville, Gainesville, Orlando, and Miami/Dade County are among the communities that have approved or are drafting such laws. The trend is spreading to many parts of the country. Fort Collins, Colorado, approved a citywide code that requires the development of interconnected, urban neighborhoods with centers. Neighborhoods are established as the city’s basic urban fabric, integrating New Urbanism with old. How often are these laws used? It is difficult to gauge the impact of new urbanist ordinances, because few have been tested. Many have only been in place a year or so. The Dade County, Florida, law, passed in 1991, is one of the oldest and widely disseminated (code author DPZ charges $10 for a version printed on a large poster. One hundred and sixty municipalities have requested it). Until 1997, no one used the Dade ordinance, because there was little demand. Now two full-scale TNDs are planned according to the law. However, in some cases ordinances are having real impact with projects coming out of the ground. The best example is Huntersville, North Carolina, which passed an ordinance in late 1996. This municipality covers a large area (64 square miles), is in a hot real estate market, and its ordinance is mandatory. “Some developers complain and whine,” says Huntersville planner Rick Kos, “but while they are doing that, others are bypassing them and coming in with plans left and right.” The town already has four TNDs in planning or construction, one of which is oriented to transit. A number of other plans have many new urbanist characteristics. The ordinance requires street connectivity, regulates by building type rather than density, and sets built-to lines. Otherwise, the law allows for a great deal of flexibility and subjectivity in stipulating how plans meet the goal of creating pedestrian- oriented neighborhoods. “I would say the flexibility is an enticement to developers — others would say the law is not specific enough,” says Kos. The Huntersville planning department has done a lot of redesigning for developers who have misunderstood the ordinance, Kos says. On the other hand, some very good plans have been submitted. Stuart, Florida, has had plenty of use for its infill code, passed in 1991. The town loosened the reins on allowed uses, while tightening controls on architecture and building types. This resulted in considerable redevelopment based on historic architectural and town planning precedent. The urban fabric has been restored at the same time that downtown occupancy has risen dramatically. Ease of use is key Orlando has realized the importance of making ordinances easy to use. The city approved its “Mixed-use Neighborhood Development District,” six years ago to promote TND, but that ordinance has never been used because it requires a conditional use permit. “It doesn’t work if you tell developers ‘we’d like you to do TND, but here are all of the additional hoops that you have to jump through,” says Rick Bernhardt, Orlando planning director. Now, Orlando has commissioned DPZ to write a new TND ordinance. Developers will not be required to use it, but they will have the right without any additional regulatory steps. Developers doing TND will pay 30 percent lower impact fees — based on an analysis, commissioned by the city, showing that mixed-use, interconnected development will cost the city less in public services and infrastructure. The code, based on DPZ’s latest version of the Operating System of the New Urbanism, an unpublished work in progress, could be described as a “state of the art” TND ordinance. It will accommodate any kind of development, including big box stores, elderly care facilities andhotels, in addition to the typical neighborhood elements, Bernhardt says. “What we are doing is creating a legislative framework to make it easy for the developer to do TND,” he explains. Andres Duany advises municipalities not to make the New Urbanism mandatory, but rather to adopt “optional overlay” zoning, and create incentives in the permitting process. “You immediately make people richer or poorer when you change the zoning,” he explains, “and that tends to get people upset.” He advises planners to “use the prerogative of the bureaucrat” and set up expedited permitting for the New Urbanism. He also advises that when writing a new urbanist planning code, keep it simple. “One mistake is that planners tend to put in too many bells and whistles,” he says. “When it is too detailed, it becomes too expensive.” Appropriate engineering standards are an important part of a workable new urbanist code, Duany emphasizes. Narrower street sections and smaller curb return radii “should be prenegotiated,” he says. Otherwise, new urbanist developers will be forced into battles with municipal engineers. Municipal planners can take a number of steps to promote the New Urbanism; some don’t even involve approving an ordinance, according to attorney Slone. “The first thing public officials can do is make policy changes — involving, for example, civic spaces, street trees, the size of municipal buses and trucks — that will make it easier to do New Urbanism,” he says. Second, planners can remove impediments in zoning codes, e.g. prohibitions against narrow streets, a mixture of uses, alleys and short setbacks. The third step would be drafting ordinances that specifically call for build-to lines, street connectivity, architectural elements, and other common characteristics of new urbanist ordinances. “That’s where you cross the line from removal of impediments to actually promoting the New Urbanism,” Slone says. using a pud Still relatively unusual is the scenario where a developer submits plans in a municipality that specifically encourages new urbanist projects. So, developers employ other strategies. One commonly used tool, adopted in many jurisdictions, is the planned unit development (PUD), a designation that gives developers broad flexibility to propose mixed-use projects. PUDs which require a special approval, can be used for both conventional and new urban projects. “PUDs remove impediments but don’t give developers incentives to do New Urbanism,” Slone explains. Where new urbanist and PUD ordinances are not in place, developers can often try for a “special use permit,” which gives municipal plan- ners broad discretion to vary from existing zoning. A last resort — but one which many new urbanist developers are forced to take — is to apply for variances. Many new urbanist projects require 30 or more variances from conventional zoning. “Any variance request raises difficult issues,” Slone says. “Regulators have to be able to defend in court why they varied from the usual standard.” The New Urbanism represents a far different community design system from conventional suburban development. Nearly everything changes — including street design and connectivity, building types and placement, the physical relationship of building uses, parking requirements, and lot sizes and shapes. Planners nationwide will have to decide whether, and how, to accommodate the New Urbanism. Municipalities listed in this issue are in the forefront of the trend.