REPORT TO CITY COUNCIL
SUBJECT
Title
Joint Study Session with the City Council, Planning Commission and Downtown Community Task Force (DCTF) on Form Based Zoning Codes.
Report
COUNCIL PILLAR
Promote and Enhance Economic, Housing and Transportation Development
BACKGROUND
Zoning Codes are a key land-use policy implementation tool that establish specific regulations for allowed land uses and development of private property. Zoning Codes are traditionally considered to address three topic areas: land use, building form and performance standards. While a Zoning Code likely includes elements of all three areas, since the 1930s, greater emphasis has been given to the regulation of uses, with the establishment of separate zones for single-family, multi-family, commercial and industrial land uses. Conventional codes also normally include regulations for building form, such as height limitations and setback requirements.
Beginning in the 1980s, Form Based Codes began emerging as an alternative approach, particularly for application to areas where a pedestrian-oriented environment and more traditional "Main Street" types of development were a priority. Form Based Codes may omit much of the land use regulations found in conventional zoning codes, thereby allowing for a mix of uses (e.g., residential above commercial) that would have been seen in a traditional Downtown environment, while also establishing very precise regulations for architectural form, such as specifications for minimum and maximum setbacks, location and size of building entries, allowable building materials and other architectural elements critical to the creation of a successful pedestrian environment.
An early and well publicized example of a community developed with a Form Based Code is Seaside, Florida, which provided the setting for the movie "The Truman Show." Seaside is essentially a modern development with a traditional town character. Proponents of Form Based Codes emphasize that they allow...
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