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<br />Rural Zoning: Return to the Village
<br />
<br />By Tom Daniels
<br />
<br />Villages hold a special place in America's heritage.
<br />
<br />The classic New England village, with its tree-
<br />lined streets, village green, and houses close.
<br />to the street, suggests a slower pace, a sense,
<br />of community, and the ability to walk to
<br />shops, schools, and playgrounds. But for
<br />most Americans, the village is a nostalgic
<br />tourist attraction rather than a place to live
<br />, and work. In the 1990s, new urbanists cited
<br />, the village as their model for recjeveloping
<br />cities and building new suburbs. Yet there
<br />was little effort to use zoning and other plan-
<br />ning techniques to revive villages in rural
<br />are~s or to protect villages within expanding
<br />metropolitan regions.
<br />Many villages have actually lost popula-
<br />tion or grown slowly while populations surged
<br />in outer suburban regions. For example,
<br />according to a Brookings Institution study of
<br />Pennsylvania, in the 1990S neariy three-quar-
<br />ters of the new housing in the state wasbuilt
<br />in the rural townships, but less than iO per-
<br />cent in villages. This "rush to the countryside"
<br />was made easy because of zoning that typi-
<br />cally required a one-, two-, or three-acre mini-
<br />mum lot size to support a house. Zoning ordi-
<br />nances that promoted cluster development or
<br />", "conseivationsubdivisions" only added to'
<br />automobile-dependent development inthe
<br />countryside.
<br />With the coming of$3 to $5 per gallon
<br />gasoline inrecentyears,the attraction ofIiv-
<br />ing in the countryside has started to wane.
<br />"The long commute has become a major drain
<br />on household budgets. The rise in gasoline
<br />prices combined with the subprime mortgage
<br />crisis has caused a sharp drop in home
<br />prices, particularly on the fringe of metro
<br />areas. At the same time, greater interest in
<br />health and c;cmvenience are attracting house-
<br />holds to places where they can walk or ride a
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<br />i bike to parks, stores, or schools.
<br />Villages can be good places to live and
<br />work if local' planners and elected officials can
<br />avoid ugly commercial strip development at the
<br />',entrance to the village and poorly designed
<br />housing at the village edge, promote their
<br />downtowns, aQddiscourage scattered housing
<br />in the countryside. New development should
<br />reinforce the compact pattem, human scale,
<br />mixed use, 'and pedestrian-friendly aspects.of
<br />village life that the ,residents cherish.
<br />
<br />A MORE REGIONAL APPROACH
<br />The Town of Richmond, VermOnt (population
<br />4.090), is located in Chittenden County in the
<br />northwest corner of the state. Chittenden
<br />County contains about one-quarter of
<br />Vermont's 640,000 residents and has grown'
<br />rapidly over the past 25 years. In 1990, the
<br />Village of Richmond (population 1,000) and
<br />the adjacent Town of Richmond (population
<br />3,000) voted to merge into a single govern-
<br />ment, known as the, TOwn of Richmond. One
<br />reason for the consolidation was to better
<br />manag\! growth.
<br />The town lies in the Winooski River valley
<br />and contains a significant amount of flood-
<br />plain. MO,st of the buildable land is on the
<br />north and south sides of the old village, away
<br />from thefloodphiin and steep slopes. The
<br />1999 zoning ordinance incl,uded a gateway
<br />commercial zoning distri~t north of the village
<br />that requires parking behind buildings as a
<br />way to minimize the feel of a commercial strip.
<br />East oftlie village, lriterstate 89 in effectJorms
<br />, a, growth boundary. North, west, and south of .
<br />the village, the town has used agricultu'ra!/res-
<br />idential zoning with a one-acre minimum lot
<br />size and a flood hazard overlay zone to keep
<br />land open.
<br />
<br />The merged government has maintained
<br />the boundaries of the former village as the cen-
<br />tral sewer and water service area. Moreover, the
<br />town offices have remained within the village.
<br />Some infill residential projects have been built
<br />within thevillage, but development adjacent to
<br />, it has been sparse because the town does not
<br />allow new residential or commercial develop-
<br />ment within the 1oo-year floodplain or on steep
<br />slopes, based on a maximum eight percent
<br />grade for new roads.
<br />The Richmond example can serve as.a
<br />model for dozens of villages and towns
<br />throughout the northeastern states. A consoli-
<br />dated government has greater control over
<br />future development, and zoning can help to
<br />maintain the village as the primary settlement
<br />and commercial center, thus limiting sprawl.
<br />
<br />HOW CAN ZONING PROMOTE; VILLAGE
<br />DEVELOPMENT?
<br />Zoning is the rnostwidely used land-use con'
<br />trol in America. The traditional purpose ofzon-
<br />ing is to separate conflicting land uses, such
<br />as an elementary school and a factory, in ,
<br />order to protect the public health, safety, al)d
<br />,welfare. After World War II, planners took the
<br />separation of land uses-co!1flicting, or not-aS
<br />gospel, and used zoning to keep residential
<br />and commercial areas apart. This greatly
<br />increased the use of the automobile for shop-
<br />ping and commuting.
<br />A comprehensive plan sets the legal
<br />foundation for the zoning ordinance, and the
<br />zoning ordinance puts the comprehensive
<br />plan into action. The future land-use map of
<br />the comprehensive plan forms the basis for
<br />the zoning map and the varioU!5 zoning dis-
<br />tricts. The text of the zoning ordinance <<;on-
<br />tains specific standards dn permitted uses, ,
<br />
<br />ZONING PRACTICE 11.08
<br />AMERiCAN PlANNING ASSOCIATION I page 2
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