Articles

Zoning for equity: raising all boats

Sundance Square in downtown Fort Worth, TX, which was developed under form-based standards. Image: Randy Hutcheson. Conventional land use regulations have contributed to a great divide in our country, producing sprawling places that are marked by a stark separation of both uses and people. But form-based zoning is emerging as a creative tool for cities to […]

New FBC a Big Win for Winooski

Winooski, a small city in northwestern Vermont that sits at the mouth of the Winooski River, tends to be overshadowed by its far larger and more populous neighbors, Burlington, South Burlington and Colchester. However, the positive effects of the form-based code (FBC) Winooski began implementing in 2015, is helping it to become one of the […]

From Desert to Oasis: Transformative FBC Will Help Turn a “Big Blank Piece of Sand” Into a Diverse, Attractive Community

At the Congress for the New Urbanism’s (CNU) Charter Awards Ceremony in Seattle on May 5, the Form-Based Codes Institute (FBCI) announced that Palm Desert, Calif., and Nashville, Tenn., had received the 2017 Driehaus Form-Based Codes Award for their implementation of innovative and effective codes. The Driehaus Form-Based Codes Award is sponsored by FBCI with […]

Practical Idealism: FBCs as the Framework for Building Sustainable Places

[wds id=”1″] Great cities, towns and neighborhoods do not develop by trial and error. Rather, their growth is guided by the community vision of those who live and work there. This view underlies the work of Geoff Ferrell and Mary Madden, principals of the Washington, D.C.-based urban design and town planning firm Ferrell Madden, who […]

Bringing User-Friendly Spaces to Costa Rica Requires Working with What Is and What Can Be

What’s the best way to introduce the first form-based code in an entire country? A team led by architect and urban planner Eduardo Castillo Cortés took a micro approach, devising an FBC that would be implemented initially in only one of the four districts that make up the small city of Curridabat, Costa Rica. Located […]

Voting with Their Feet: Study Tracks the Growing Popularity of Walkable Urban Metro Areas

Walkable urban places (WalkUPs) have sprouted up in all 30 of the nation’s largest metropolitan areas and increasingly are sought after, supported and promoted by businesses and the public and for good reason. These metro areas, which host 619 regionally significant WalkUPs, attract a well-educated and wealthy workforce and command higher business and residential rents […]

Leading from in Front and from Behind: Opticos Design Uses a Grassroots Approach to Improve Urban Planning

“When listeners become leaders, the world changes.” –Rev. Kellen Roggenbuck Traditionally, U.S. cities and towns are planned and designed by urban planners, architects and local government officials without much input from future or even current residents. The approach is a prescriptive one that is designed to regulate — and at its worst, dictate — where […]

Form-Based Codes Create Communities Where Residents Can Comfortably Age in Place

What type of community do you want to live in once you reach retirement age? Although many seniors have opted in the past to move to warm-weather locations or retirement villages, an increasing number are not interested in relocating. According to a 2014 report by AARP, a national nonprofit organization that seeks to improve people’s […]

2016 Driehaus Award Winning FBCs Reflect the Unique Character, Aspirations of the Cities They Help to Reshape

Last June, FBCI presented the 2016 Driehaus Form-Based Code Award to Delray Beach, Fla., and Lacey, Wash., and gave honorable mention to Thompson’s Landing, Tenn., to acknowledge their development, adoption and implementation of innovative and effective form-based codes. This year’s honorees represent a diverse group of communities. One is a beach town that […]

Obama Administration’s Housing Development “Toolkit”

The toolkit promotes urban zoning reform to increase and diversify housing availability The toolkit, which the White House released in late September, calls for the development of “high-density and multifamily zoning,” “streamlining or shortening permitting processes and timelines,” and allowing “by-right development,” all of which are in line with elements t of form-based codes. The […]