In my first post, I made a passing reference to Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk's Smartcode, in which the idea of transect based zoning is introduced. In this week's post, I would like to further explore the idea of zoning by discussing the history of zoning in the United States, giving a passing nod to transect based zoning, and looking at the idea of zoning itself. I would like to pose some basic questions about zoning, question its legitimacy, and ask if there's a better way to view zoning. I would also like to introduce new ideas regarding zoning categories, how zoning fits (or doesn't) into a larger legal framework, and how we might be able to move forward with a better framework for thinking of zoning.
Firstly, I should note that I will be coming back to the idea behind Battling Burnham and the unrecognized dichotomy between planners and designers in future posts, but I wanted this to be one of my first posts because it's quite important to me and because it's one of the biggest, nearly unaddressed issues in urban planning. Virtually everyone agrees that the separation of uses in urban development has led to disastrous results for cities. That it has been disasterous has in fact become canon for urban planners. The culprit behind the separation of uses? Euclidean zoning. Through the supreme court case of Euclid v. Ambler, zoning was bolstered and began to spread quickly throughout the United States and around the world. The purpose? The separation of uses. The idea behind this traditional idea of zoning was that industry should not be near residences (sounds reasonable), residences should not be near commercial (I'm not sure what that logic is...) and nothing should be near agriculture (sorry, farmers). This, in short, has been one of the major causes of urban sprawl over the past century. As soon as people began to be removed from life's everyday activities, communities began to dissolve. People no longer saw their neighbors at the store, and neighborhoods lost the interconnectedness that had previously made the neighborhood such an important element in urban life. To be sure, this effect was not felt overnight. Nor was zoning the only thing that led to it. It took many years for most cities to adopt Euclidean zoning and, even then, the policies took many years to have their effect since these types of policies affect new development, not old. Nevertheless, after a few decades and with the help of a new national highway system, the benefits of living in the city (easy access to daily needs like stores, restaurants, and employment) had been negated by exclusive use zoning and America was on its way to the suburbs.
And so zoning progressed largely unchanged through the twentieth century. Then came Duany Plater-Zyberk and their Smartcode. And suddenly the obvious presented itself. Euclidean zoning gets its name from the Supreme Court case where zoning was determined to be legal, not mandatory. Cities are allowed to make decisions about if and what kind of zoning they would like for their town. Hidden within the Smartcode, which focuses on regulating architectural elements, setbacks, lot size, etc., is a completely new way of looking at zoning, the transect based approach. In journalism, this is what's called 'burying the lead'. Codes governing architectural elements are nothing new. I don't think they've ever been quite this well organized before, but the really interesting development in the Smartcode is the transect based approach to zoning. The real advantage to the transect based approach is that it recognizes the way cities actually develop, rather than attempting to impose an artificial order based on a 'vision' of how the city should develop. The basic principle of transect based zoning is that the rules that govern use and densities should come from where the zone falls in the urban hierarchy. The most intense, dense, and diverse area of the city should be downtown, while those things would be decreased as the zone moves farther away from the city center towards agricultural land on the outskirts of town. This, in theory at least, would help to avoid the wasted potential of a city that uses Euclidean zoning. That potential comes both in the form of unmet demand for housing (for example) in a commercial zone, as well as the obvious empty, undeveloped lots in areas that have been zoned commercial where there is no excess demand for commercial development (with similar examples valid in other areas of the city).
To be sure, I'm not actually endorsing transect based zoning. I know, I stopped only short of calling it revolutionary. But my argument is instead that transect based zoning is light-years ahead of Euclidean zoning, not that it is an ultimate end in urban zoning policy. Furthermore, transect based zoning is so important because the nation has spent the better part of last century believing that the only options on the table are either to have no control over the city, or to implement exclusive zoning policies. Duany doesn't just present an additional option, but points out to us that there are an infinite number of ways to view zoning policy. Hopefully, there will be a wide range of new options for cities in the years to come. Perhaps it is a conceit, but we can at least hope that the tyranny of Euclidean zoning is coming to an end.
Having said that, I would like to add my own take on zoning to the argument. I see no need for zoning at all. I have always seen zoning as a way to ensure that those who can afford it are allowed to locate far from those urban uses that are necessary for the functioning of the city, but which no one wants to live near. If a use is so repulsive to society as not to be allowed in some parts of the city, then why is it allowed in other parts? I can fully understand banning some types of industrial activity, or at least banning its negative effects, like noise, air, and water pollution; but I cannot understand the mentality that tells people that it's okay to reserve the activity to some areas of the city, but not others. Economic necessity demands that the outcome of that policy is that the poorest citizens will live next to the rail yards, prisons, and industrial facilities. Furthermore, in no other area of law do we accept that there is one set of rules that applies to certain people, and another set that applies to everyone else. I am aware however, that removing the practice of zoning altogether isn't on radar as an option. The public doesn't even consider it possible that a city could exist in such a state (despite 5,000 years of civilization proving otherwise). The public might be able to consider such a notion, but it would take years of campaigning to convince them of the legitimacy of such an option, and that campaign would need to start with planners (and perhaps economists), and most planners have yet to adopt a supportive position of transect based zoning, or even abandon their support of traditional Euclidean zoning. So, we have quite a long road on this issue and, for the moment, transect based zoning is the best option available. But I hope for more options in the future as well as more planner and public engagement on the issue.
In regards to those future zoning systems that could very well be devised in coming years, I think it helps to consider two different approaches to zoning and what the implications are for the city: restrictive and prescriptive zoning practices. I am already aware of the connotations of these two words and the problems with their use. Nevertheless, they are accurate. Restrictive zoning practices would function, much as the rest of our legal system does, by describing what cannot be done. So, for example the zoning system might restrict all industrial uses, or it might simply restrict certain types or levels of pollution. Prescriptive zoning is what we currently have. Re-identifying the exclusive zoning practices as prescriptive serves to do more than add another word to the nation's planning lexicon. It places traditional Euclidean zoning in a broader context in which other, future zoning policies might also be placed. The common quality they would share is an approach that operates by describing specifically what can be done in a particular zone, rather than the reverse. Prescriptive zoning.
Needless to say, I support the former. The reason? In a free country, laws should be structured to tell you what you can't do, not what you can. While this isn't a legal argument (the issue of the legality of Euclidean zoning has, of course, been settled), the idea of prescriptive zoning goes heavily against the grain of Anglo-American legal philosophy going back to Magna Carta. The law is structured to let the public know what is not allowed in society, until we look at planning law. The practice of zoning, as it currently stands, does exactly the opposite. If your lot is zoned for a particular use, that is what you must do with it. Unless, of course you have the political influence to get your zoning changed. I believe that any approach to zoning in the future can be categorized as either a restrictive or prescriptive policy.
In any case, while the legality of Euclidean zoning is well established, neither the necessity nor the advantage of the practice is widely agreed on in planning circles. Exclusive use practices for urban land is generally agreed to be the root of many contemporary urban ills and I know of no one who argues for any benefits. So, while we know that cities can practice exclusive use zoning, it does not necessarily follow that we should. I plan to return to this issue in future posts, as I think it's important to look at some real world examples of Euclidean zoning in practice and why we need to change it.
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