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Is there a way we can revamp America's thousands
of miles of miles of cluttered commercial roadways?
We all know them -- auto alleys lined with
strip malls, gas stations, franchised food stands, muffler
shops and discount hotels by the dozens. Curb cuts proliferate.
Traffic roars along beside narrow sidewalks (if any sidewalks
at all).
For motorists, these roadways are often
nightmares; for pedestrians, they can be mortal threats --
even though residences, particularly for lower income people,
often line these arteries.
Traditional zoning and parking requirements
have permitted, even fostered these environments. Is there
an alternative?
"Yes" say a group of intrepid
urban planners. To remake a 3.5-mile stretch of Columbia Pike
in Arlington, Va., they're ditching standard zoning in favor
of a new system of "form-based codes." Their approach
actually invites local residents and business people to take
a lead in redesigning their own environment.
Few question Columbia Pike's need of a radical
redmake. It's a traffic-choked mélange of stores, drive-throughs
and apartment complexes surrounded by acres of parking lots.
Cars roar by at up to 50 miles an hour. There's been no major
construction in 40 years. Urban planner Geoffrey Ferrell calls
the pike a "linear greyfield of asphalt."
But the Columbia Pike neighborhood is not
an economic disaster. Thousands of immigrants -- Ethiopians,
Guatemala, Salvadorans and many others -- have poured in over
recent years. Over 40 languages are spoken in the homes of
students in one local school. Some quality ethnic restaurants
have filtered in--though often hidden behind fast-food emporia.
The breakthrough came when New Urbanist
author Peter Katz, a lead expert on form-based codes, persuaded
Arlington County Commission Chair Christopher Zimmerman and
Tim Lynch, head of the Columbia Pike Redevelopment Commission,
to give the new code system a try.
Start, Katz counseled, with a "charrette"
-- a week-long set of meetings of residents with designers,
gauging public wishes and checking out alternatives with them.
So the Arlington planners commissioned Ferrell's
firm to write the new codes, and the Miami-based firm of Dover
Kohl, wizards of citizen participation technique and New Urbanist
concepts, to run the charrettes.
The residents and business people ended
up endorsing a fairly dense version of the classic American
Main Street. But not cold high-rise complexes, they insisted
-- they were open to structures as tall as six stories, but
nothing like the collections of soaring structures, with dead
street fronts and many blank walls, they'd seen in some of
Northern Virginia's edge cities.
We want, they said, varieties of architecture.
We'd like to accommodate a variety of local stores, including
the ethnic restaurants. We like the idea of focusing commercial
development at major intersections. And please give us broad
sidewalks -- indeed much friendlier, more walkable streets.
With those instructions, Ferrell started
writing form-based codes. Future buildings directly on the
pike would have to be at least three, but not more than six,
stories high, with few blank walls. Parking would have to
be moved behind new structures -- not directly facing the
pike. The roadway would be redesigned with broad sidewalks,
ample tree plantings, and space for rapid bus or even rail
transit.
Under the new codes the zoning system's
artificial divisions would be scrapped. The market would be
left to decide what goes where. A prime example: Residences
over stores would be welcomed, not prohibited as zoning typically
does. And requirements for on-site parking would be dramatically
reduced.
The Arlington Council approved the codes,
6-0. Technically they're just a voluntary substitute for existing
zoning. But they carry a powerful incentive -- assurance of
faster permit approval.
And the incentive is working. A 16-unit
development of live-and-work townhouses got a rapid OK, with
a number of business leaseholders becoming eager buyers. Another
townhouse development, conforming to the new codes, got approved
in a virtually unheard-of 30-day period. Neighbors on its
block endorsed it unanimously.
"We think these form-based codes uncork
the bottle to let the small developer in" for all manner
of infill development, Ferrell asserts. "Before you had
to be a big player, acquire a lot of land and then provide
a lot of parking space. We're making it much easier."
Big outfits are interested, too: a couple
of major grocery stores are now looking to upgrade their Columbia
Pike facilities, using the new code freedom to put at least
two stories of housing units on top of their stores.
Arlington's form-based codes suggest a
promising new approach -- up-front citizen consultation, less
regulation, quicker approvals, flexible building forms, and
a way to revive old roadways and develop the new worker housing
that's desperately needed in many communities. We've long
needed a better formula for our older commercial roads. Maybe
this is it.
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