HOME | INDEX | ABOUT US | FEEDBACK

Compact Building Design Design Centers and Institutes Design Guidelines Form-Based Codes Incentive Zoning Mixed-Use Development New Urbanism Overlay Zones Sector Plans SmartCode Urban Growth Boundaries (UGB) Walkable Neighborhoods

New Urbanism

The New Urbanism – or what is also called Traditional Neighborhood Development (TND) – has it roots in Florida’s Panhandle. The country’s first New Urbanist development was the now 25-year old Seaside in Walton County. Since Seaside, the number of New Urbanist developments has multiplied. Today, Florida has the most New Urbanist developments in the United States, and the principles of the New Urbanism have been used in Florida to achieve a wide variety of community and regional goals. The developments range from providing affordable housing, protecting natural systems and farmland, and redeveloping inner city areas and outdated strip malls to revitalizing downtowns, creating mixed-use town centers for single-use suburban neighborhoods, and designing new towns.

Seaside’s designers based the town on a study of the planning principles that made Florida’s traditional small towns – places like Apalachicola, downtown Pensacola, and DeFuniak Springs – so successful. Those planning principles form the basis of today’s New Urbanism, which promotes compact mixed-use developments that begin with neighborhoods sized for walking as the basic building block. New Urbanist neighborhoods offer a variety of housing choices located within easy walking distance of most daily needs and an interconnected network of pedestrian-friendly streets and accessible public spaces, making it possible to live, work, shop, and play without getting into a car. Town and neighborhood centers, public spaces, civic uses, and other features are designed at the human scale to foster a sense of community.

The New Urbanism provides an alternative to the suburban development patterns required by most zoning ordinances that are based on a separation of land uses, large lots, deep building setbacks, and wide streets and do not permit the mix of land uses and pedestrian-oriented, more compact development called for in the New Urbanism. As a result, a change in local zoning is usually required. To solve that problem, an increasing number of Florida communities have adopted a Traditional Neighborhood Development code to specifically enable and promote the New Urbanism. Those codes can be voluntary or mandatory and can be applied citywide or to a specific geographic area. Another option is called a floating code – one that is authorized by law but not assigned to a specific property or geographic area. The use of a floating code is triggered by an application from a landowner to rezone a property under the zone.

 

Click on image to see full-size

Seaside, Florida
 Eighty-acre Seaside is a new community designed according to the scale and character of an historic, small southern town, including the layout of streets and squares and the location of uses (a mix of single-and multi-family residential units and commercial and public space). The interconnected network of streets encourages walking, and the public realm extends throughout the neighborhoods in the form of sandy paths that provide a variety of routes for moving about the town. Retail is in the form of a civic downtown with a common green, an inn, a conference center that doubles as town hall, and other civic amenities. Small kiosks provide an inexpensive place for retailers, and a beach pavilion is one of the community’s focal points. The design of public and private buildings reflects the regional vernacular architecture, and the development makes use of native landscaping. The success of Seaside is evidenced in the sale of its lots, which have increased from $15,000 to as much as $1 million today. (This information was taken from A Guidebook to New Urbanism in Florida 2005, published by the Florida Chapter of the Congress for the New Urbanism [www.cnuflorida.org]. More information on Seaside is at www.seasidefl.com and from Duany Plater-Zyberk & Company [www.dpz.com].)

Click on image to see full-size

North Miami Beach New Urbanism Zoning District
The intent of the North Miami Beach New Urbanism Zoning District, which was enacted in 2002, is to create a traditional town center that provides a community gathering point and pedestrian environment and creates a sense of place. The creation of such a center addressed the lack of a downtown. The district, which covers 20 city blocks, requires mixed-use buildings that front sidewalks, prohibits buildings from being set back, reduces parking requirements and locates parking behind buildings, and requires a two-story minimum height, along with minimum densities. The district’s zoning also addresses building form, such as massing and windows, and establishes a unique character for primary and secondary streets. The intent of each requirement is illustrated. (More information on the North Miami Beach New Urbanism Zoning District is available from www.citynmb.com, or A Guidebook to New Urbanism in Florida 2005 [www.cnuflorida.org].)