UPDATE AS OF 9/13/08:

On September 11, 2008, the EPC held their third hearing on the revised draft Form Based Zones.  The Commission will continue to hear the FBZ:

• Thursday September 25, 2008 at 3:00PM. 
• Plaza del Sol basement hearing room at 600 2nd St. NW. 

June 2008 Draft for Public Review

• Section A, General Provisions
• Section B, Zones
• Section C, Building Types, Street Design, Parking, Signage, Usable Open Space

Free black-and-white copy of the revised June 2008 draft is available at the City Council office on the 9th floor of City Hall.

Revisions have been modified in response to:

• an extensive review of community and stakeholder comments,
• recommendations from City agencies and Council selected technical team,
• issues encountered by local planning efforts using form based code models,
• and extensive testing of implementation and administration of the October 31, 2007 draft.

In addition, coordination efforts have been made with the Comprehensive Plan, Centers and Corridors, the Albuquerque Energy Conservation Code, and the City Zoning Code.

In order to facilitate use of the document as a tool for application in appropriate locations citywide, the following changes have been made:

1. The Form Based Code is now part of the Zoning Code’s General Regulations, implemented through the Code’s SU-1 or SU-2/SU-1 processes. In order to insert the document into the City Zoning Code as §14-16-3-20, the general formatting of the document has changed to match the formatting style of the existing City Zoning Code.
2. Document sections are now: Section A, General Provisions; Section B, Form Based Code Zones; Section C, Components: Building Types, Building Frontages, Street Design, Parking, Lighting, Signage, Usable Open Space.

Significant changes to each Section of Form Based Code

Section A, General Provisions.

• Language was added to the General provisions establishing the use of the zones as allowed by Resolution 270-1980. Justifications were made based on adopted City plans and policies.
• Based on comments that incentives should be addressed, a list of incentives was included.
• Based on concerns that the previous implementation process was unclear, a new implementation process was adopted and is described.
• Previous language regarding the administration of the zones was clarified and simplified.
• The previous Definitions section has been removed and coordinated with the Zoning Code. Additional applicable terms utilized by the Form Based Code may be added to the definitions section of the Zoning Code.

Section B, Zones.

The Form Based Zones now includes five zones:

1. TOD-MAC (Transit-Oriented Development Major Activity Center)
2. TOD-COM (Transit-Oriented Development Community Activity Center)
3. MX (Mixed-Use)
4. ID (Infill Development)
5. PND (Planned Neighborhood Development)

They have been reorganized to reflect level of intensity of development. The Campus Zone has been removed upon further review of applicability by the Council appointed technical team and community comments suggesting that it is a development form inconsistent with transit oriented form based development.

Based on the intent of the previous October 31 draft, each zone provides a list of development criteria setting limits for heights, uses, building placement and building frontage articulation and provides parking, landscape and usable open space requirements. In addition, each zone lists allowable building components that include building and frontage types, street types, signage types and lighting standards that are found in Section C. Each zone maintains the same formatting structure to facilitate use, with specific data relative to zone intent. However the following specific modifications were made:

• The criteria for establishment of zones were simplified and coordinated with Centers and Corridors, existing zoning designations and patterns of development.
• Densities and Intensities have been removed from TOD-MAC, TOD-COM, MX and ID. This modification was made based upon analysis of their intent, the overall premise of a form based code to regulate use and density through building envelope and technical team advisement that capping densities and intensities may act as an obstacle to redevelopment. 
• Parking calculations are by zone and based on square footages of residential and commercial uses and are no longer based on specific land uses. This change has been made due to the lack of emphasis on building uses in Code. The technical team advised on the square footage calculations. 
• Other specific changes related to height, fenestration percentages, shading elements, open space calculations, landscape calculations from the October 31 draft to each zones’ requirements are based on an analysis of implementation capabilities, community and stakeholder comments, technical team discussions and requests by council staff. 
• Mixed use requirements have been modified per technical team and community comments. 
• The administration of the Infill zone is based on existing zoning height limitations and allows for neighborhood commercial uses.

Section C, Components: Building Types, Building Types, Street Design, Parking, Lighting, Signage Usable Open Space.

• Building Forms are now Building Types. Uses have been removed from Building Type Descriptions. Council staff, technical team and community comments expressed concern with specific uses being applied to a building form. A guiding principle of form based code zoning is to allow any use to occur within a building as long as it is consistent with the building form.
• “A” and “ B” street designations are no longer used. Street designation system created many potential development conflicts and was determined superfluous by the technical team, community comments and planners experienced with applying form based code standards.
• Connectivity ratio is no longer used. Block sizes and perimeter limits are set in the zones. Community comments, technical team and council staff expressed the difficulty of understanding and utilizing the ratio. Further research determined that the ratio is difficult to enforce due to scale issues and applicability issues in built environments. Setting block and perimeter limits provide for connectivity.
• Street sections have been reintroduced as an alternative to DPM standards. Community comments and technical team expressed interest in having an alternative option to DPM standards for streets which are more compatible with transit, traditional neighborhoods, and pedestrian friendly developments.
• Building Material section has been removed. Community comments and technical team expressed concern that this section imposed undue limitations on architectural freedom and creativity.
• Lighting section has been modified to coordinate with zoning code standards. Community comments, technical team and zoning enforcement expressed concern that the lighting standards did not address many issues already in the zoning code.
• Signage section has been modified to coordinate with work from technical advisors. Technical team expressed concern with the signage standards and is working to develop new standards. 

Purpose of the Form Based Code

The Form Based Code is intended to redress the gap that exists between present development patterns and our community’s aspirations as expressed in the City / County Comprehensive Plan and the Planned Growth Strategy. One cause of this inconsistency is that Comprehensive Plan policies have not been adequately translated into changes in the structure of City law, regulations, procedures and financial charges. Albuquerque enacted its Zoning Code in 1959 without the guidance of a comprehensive plan. The Comprehensive Plan was adopted between 1964 and 1972. At that time, the City did not engage in a thorough review of zoning in order to make these land-use requirements consistent with the long-term goals and policies contained in the comprehensive plan.

Policy Context

The Albuquerque/Bernalillo County Comprehensive Plan and the Planned Growth Strategy guide the future development of Albuquerque.  Both of these documents seek to create and support a city where residents need to travel fewer miles every day to go about their lives, where development along and around transit facilities supports the functioning of transit.

The Planned Growth Strategy is a long range strategy to encourage a more efficient and sustainable urban form for the City.  The Form Based Code was identified in the Planned Growth Strategy as one of the tools needed to create and support a city where: 

• a variety of housing types are available, including town and village versions like “living over the store” and row houses,
• development takes place as a mixture of uses rather than large acreages of single land use types,
• residents are closer to shopping and services,
• there is an active pedestrian life,
• development is characterized by human rather than automotive scale, and
• a city whose older, established areas are as well-kept and vital as its new ones.

Basic Principles that underlie Form Based Code

• ACCESSIBILITY: Encourages development that offers retail goods and services within walking, biking or short transit distance of places to live and work.
• FLEXIBILITY: Provides a variety of building forms, some of which support the mixture of a variety of uses and bring residents closer to businesses.
• SERVING NEIGHBORHOODS: Allows some areas of the community that are finer grained – where we develop in an integrated fashion, not in large scale, single use parcels.
  • Such development is more likely to be able to accommodate local businesses and smaller businesses, which in turn become critical quality of life elements for nearby residential areas.
• SUPPORTIVE OF TRANSIT: Encourages development that is shaped by and utilizes a functioning transit system.
• MULTI-MODAL STREETS: Accommodates cars, but is not dominated by them.  Buildings are easily accessible by foot traffic and transit.
  • Buildings are close to the street and its sidewalk.
  • Entrances are clearly identified architecturally.
  • Parking is most often behind buildings or in structures.
  • Streets are identified as “A” (pedestrian oriented) or “B” (vehicle oriented) with respect to the site.
• SUSTAINABILITY: Gives developers and neighborhoods the opportunity to create something that fits with our times and our values.
  • An aging population cannot always drive yet wants to age in place.
  • Resources are becoming more precious; we need to use them more efficiently.
  • Examples of resources:
  • Fuel for transportation and heating
  • Water
  • Locally produced food
  • Air quality
  • Land well-served with infrastructure
  • Construction material
• CONTEXT SENSITIVE: Makes sensitive transitions to existing neighborhoods.
• ECONOMIC VIABILITY: Provides market incentives for the development or redevelopment of neglected property.

Form Based Zoning Is Not New to Albuquerque

The City of Albuquerque, since 2000, has adopted a number of plans that include Form Based Code provisions.  Some of these include:

• 12th and Menaul Study
• Downtown 2010 Sector Development Plan
• High Desert
• Huning Highland EDO Regulatory Plan
• La Cueva
• Nob Hill Highland Sector Development Plan
• Sawmill
• Volcano Heights Sector Development Plan

Additionally, the Mesa del Sol Planned Community, the SunCal Planned Community, and the West Side Strategic Plan incorporate many Form Based Code principles.

The FBC has been developed to add another “tool” that can be used in plans which establish development regulations, such as Sector Development Plans and Corridor Plans.

The new zones in the FBC are recommended by the City of Albuquerque’s Planned Growth Strategy (PGS).

Application

The Council will not put the Form Based Code into effect city-wide. The current zoning code will remain in place. The FBC represents an alternative to the current zoning districts. Any public or private entity that wants to use the FBC will need to apply for a zone map amendment and go through the normal public process: going before the Environmental Planning Commission, either to approve the zone map amendment or in some cases to recommend to the City Council whether to approve the amendment, and, if necessary, going through an appeal process. This process applies equally to a zone map amendment initiated by the City.

After it is adopted, the FBC – both its Building Forms and its Zones – will be available for consideration for use in:

• sector plans
• corridor plans
• community activity center master plans

Such plans may use the FBC as an overlay for existing zoning, may adopt some of the FBC zones (with or without modifications), may adopt some of the Building Forms, or ignore the FBC.

Presently, sector plans and zone map amendments are often highly unpredictable and contentious processes between neighbors, the City and developers. Every new sector plan starts from scratch, yet deals with a common thread of problems: safety, mobility, economic vitality and quality of our public environment. The FBC is an opportunity for neighbors and developers to visualize and agree upon forms of redevelopment that will not be harmful to residents but rather make for healthier businesses and quality of life.