#zoning codes

Executive order 14,394…

Ever Wonder Why Affordable Housing is an Oxymoron?

Ever wonder why the term “affordable housing” is an oxymoron in Ontario?

I visited a client in a small township south of Ottawa yesterday. She lives on a rural property in the home shown above.

She wanted to add a tiny coach house to her property for her adult daughter to live in so she built one; it has a common wall with a storage shed. It is also shown above.

The storage shed is the basis for a successful home-based business they run--they sell recycled, pre-owned windows and doors.

The problem with  their coach house? They have to renew its occupancy permit every three years--it’s only a temporary use, which can be revoked at any three year interval at the pleasure of their local council.

This makes no sense. 

They’ve protested so vehemently that: a) local council refuses to speak with them or allow any of their staff to speak with them--they’re only allowed to communicate with the township’s solicitor (for which he bills them his time, talk about double dipping and conflict of interest) and b) council gave them an exemption that allows them to keep their coach house as long as ownership of the property doesn’t change hands, which, of course, depresses, the value of their property. 

I mean if one day you bought the place and the business, you’d have to bear the cost of tearing it down and the loss of its rental income.

This is why people like James Howard Kunstler (author of Home from Nowhere, 1998) and others have pretty much given up--the only advice they can give folks is: “Burn all your zoning codes.”

It also explains why I have the utmost respect for building, health, fire and safety codes, but almost none for most zoning rules and regulations. 

I've been running into this term- "form based code"- in a lot of articles related to urban planning lately, and being a mere dilettante, had no clue what that meant.  It's quite simple really, and because I am in no way qualified to explain the specifics, I will direct you to this summary drafted by none other than the Form-Based Codes Institute (FBCI):

"Form-based codes foster predictable built results and a high-quality public realm by using physical form (rather than separation of uses) as the organizing principle for the code. They are regulations, not mere guidelines, adopted into city or county law. Form-based codes offer a powerful alternative to conventional zoning.

Form-based codes address the relationship between building facades and the public realm, the form and mass of buildings in relation to one another, and the scale and types of streets and blocks. The regulations and standards in form-based codes are presented in both words and clearly drawn diagrams and other visuals. They are keyed to a regulating plan that designates the appropriate form and scale (and therefore, character) of development, rather than only distinctions in land-use types.

This approach contrasts with conventional zoning's focus on the micromanagement and segregation of land uses, and the control of development intensity through abstract and uncoordinated parameters (e.g., FAR, dwellings per acre, setbacks, parking ratios, traffic LOS), to the neglect of an integrated built form. Not to be confused with design guidelines or general statements of policy, form-based codes are regulatory, not advisory. They are drafted to implement a community plan. They try to achieve a community vision based on time-tested forms of urbanism. Ultimately, a form-based code is a tool; the quality of development outcomes depends on the quality and objectives of the community plan that a code implements."

*THE MORE YOU KNOW.*

I was interested in looking it up because after reading/posting an excerpt from that article about Frank Lloyd Wright and Broadacre city, I was reminded of how much information has coming my way lately about trying to reject similar plans [to Broadacre] in new approaches to city and suburban development, not only because suburban sprawl is wasteful, but also because the spread out environment can promote dull and unhealthy cultural and social environments. 

Land use zoning makes a lot of sense in the context of suburban sprawl because of the underlying and misguided idea of unlimited space that accompanies it.  However it doesn't offer a lot of opportunities for the architecture of a community to create an aesthetically stimulating atmosphere or even to conduct the kind of visual conversation that is possible in denser cities.  If every building is an isolated monolith, the landscape becomes rather tiring after a while.

Buffalo Green Code

Previously we discussed the Brownfield Opportunity Areas (BOAs) that are being revitalized in the city. But how will the revitalization of these areas be determined? The answer is with Buffalo's newly updated zoning code touted by the Mayor Brown as the Buffalo Green Code. Updating the code has been one of Brown's biggest projects as it hasn't been revamped since 1953.